Breakdown of Mér sýnist að maðurinn sé að læðast í garðinum.
vera
to be
maðurinn
the man
mér
me (dative)
að
to (infinitive marker)
í
in / into / to (before the hour, in telling time) / per (in frequency expressions)
garðurinn
the park / the garden
sýnast
to seem
læðast
to sneak (move stealthily)
Questions & Answers about Mér sýnist að maðurinn sé að læðast í garðinum.
Why does the sentence start with the dative pronoun mér?
The verb sýnast is an impersonal verb that requires a dative experiencer. Instead of a normal subject doing an action, the grammar works more like 'it appears to me.' The person getting this impression is put in the dative case, so ég becomes mér.
Why is the verb sé used here instead of the regular form er?
The verb sýnast expresses a subjective impression rather than a concrete fact. Because you are stating how things appear to you, it triggers the subjunctive mood in the following að clause. Therefore, the indicative er becomes the subjunctive sé.
Both sýnist and læðast end in -st. Are they doing the same grammatical job here?
They are both middle-voice verbs, but they behave differently. Sýnist is used as an impersonal perception verb. Læðast (to sneak) simply exists permanently in the middle voice and is used here as a normal action verb in the continuous tense: sé að læðast.
Why is the word for garden, garðinum, in the dative case?
The preposition í takes the dative case when describing a static location, meaning where something currently is. Because the sneaking is happening inside the garden, rather than movement directed into the garden from the outside, we use the dative form garðinum.
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