Questions & Answers about Vi hoppas att du kommer snart.
What does the word att do here? Can I leave it out?
att is the subordinator “that,” introducing the clause att du kommer snart (“that you’ll come soon”). In everyday speech it’s often dropped: Vi hoppas du kommer snart. In careful writing it’s safer to keep att, especially if the clause is long or could be ambiguous.
Why is kommer in the present if we mean the future?
Swedish often uses the present tense to talk about the future when there’s a time expression like snart. So du kommer snart naturally means “you will come soon.” You can also say:
- Vi hoppas att du ska komma snart (focus on your intention/plan).
- Vi hoppas att du kommer att komma snart (a neutral “will” form, but clunky here because of the double “komma”). The original sentence is the most natural.
Why isn’t it att kommer du snart? Doesn’t Swedish have V2 word order?
V2 (verb in second position) applies to main clauses, not to subordinate clauses. After att, the subject comes before the verb: att du kommer snart, not att kommer du snart. In a main-clause question you would invert: Kommer du snart?
Where does snart go? Is att du snart kommer also correct?