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El chico está triste porque el libro es difícil.

El chico está triste porque el libro es difícil.
The boy is sad because the book is difficult.
From Lesson 13:The verb estar (estoy, estás)·Spanish (Spain)

Questions & Answers about El chico está triste porque el libro es difícil.

Both está and es mean "is". Why do we use está for the boy and es for the book?
This sentence perfectly shows the difference between the two Spanish verbs for "to be" (estar and ser). We use está (from estar) for the boy because sadness is a temporary feeling or state. We use es (from ser) for the book because being difficult is a permanent characteristic of that book.
If the sentence was about a girl (la chica), would triste change to trista?
No, it would stay exactly the same: la chica está triste. Adjectives that end in -e (like triste) or a consonant (like difícil) use the same form for both masculine and feminine nouns. They only change if you are talking about plural nouns, where they would become tristes and difíciles.
Doesn't por qué mean "why"? Why is it written as porque here?
When written as two words with an accent mark (¿por qué?), it means "why" and is used in questions. When written as one single word without an accent (porque), it means "because" and is used to give a reason, just like in this sentence.
Why does difícil have an accent mark on the first í?
The accent mark tells you which syllable to stress when you speak. In Spanish, words ending in an -l usually have the spoken stress on the very last syllable. But in difícil, we stress the middle syllable (di-FEE-sil). The written accent on the í shows us that we need to break the normal pronunciation rule.

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