Vi ska inte skjuta upp raketen förrän om ett år.
We will not launch the rocket until a year from now.
Breakdown of Vi ska inte skjuta upp raketen förrän om ett år.
ett
a, an (neuter)
vi
we
inte
not
ska
will
året
the year
om
in (time from now)
förrän
until (in negative sentences)
skjuta upp
to launch (rockets, spacecraft)
raketen
the rocket
Questions & Answers about Vi ska inte skjuta upp raketen förrän om ett år.
Why do we use förrän here instead of tills for 'until'?
In Swedish, förrän is only used when the main clause is negative. Because we have the negative word inte in the first part of the sentence (Vi ska inte...), we must use förrän. If the sentence were positive, like 'We will wait until...', you would use tills instead.
Why is there an om right after förrän?
To say 'in a year' or 'a year from now' when talking about the future, Swedish uses om ett år. When you add 'until' to the sentence, Swedish keeps that preposition, so förrän om ett år literally translates to 'until in a year'. English usually drops the 'in', but Swedish requires the om to show it is a future amount of time.
What does skjuta upp mean, and how does it work here?
skjuta upp is a particle verb that literally translates to 'shoot up', which is why it is used for launching a rocket. Keep in mind that in everyday conversations, skjuta upp is also the most common way to say 'postpone' or 'put off' a plan.
Why is the word order skjuta upp raketen rather than skjuta raketen upp?
In Swedish particle verbs, the small preposition or adverb (the particle, which is upp here) almost always stays right next to the verb. It is placed before the object (raketen), unlike in English where you can often split the verb and the particle up.
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