Breakdown of Eu ganhar a lotaria amanhã?! Isso é ridículo!
eu
I
ser
to be
isso
that
amanhã
tomorrow
ganhar
to win
ridículo
ridiculous
a lotaria
the lottery
Questions & Answers about Eu ganhar a lotaria amanhã?! Isso é ridículo!
Why is the infinitive ganhar used here instead of a future or conditional tense like ganharei or ganharia?
This is the Repudiation Infinitive. It is used in exclamations to express shock, outrage, or total disbelief at an idea. Keeping the verb in the infinitive strips away time and reality, treating the action as an absurd concept rather than a real event. Notice how English does the exact same thing here: "Me win... ?!"
English uses the object pronoun "Me" in "Me win the lottery?!". Why does Portuguese use the subject pronoun Eu?
In Portuguese, even when a verb is in the infinitive, if it has a specific doer, you must use a subject pronoun (like eu, tu, ele). Object pronouns like mim can never be the subject of a verb in Portuguese, even in exclamations.
Why does the second sentence use Isso instead of Isto or Aquilo?
Isso is the perfect word to refer back to an abstract idea, statement, or situation that was just introduced in the conversation. Since the speaker is pointing back to the freshly mentioned concept of winning the lottery, isso is the natural choice.
Can this structure be used to express disbelief about something in the past, or is it only for the future like amanhã?
The Repudiation Infinitive is completely timeless! You use the exact same infinitive structure whether the absurd idea is in the past, present, or future. If you wanted to say "Me win the lottery yesterday?!", you would just swap the time word: Eu ganhar a lotaria ontem?!
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