Breakdown of Hon skulle ha ansträngt sig mer om hon hade vetat.
hon
she
ha
to have
veta
to know (facts, information)
om
if, whether
mer
more
skulle
would
anstränga sig
to make an effort
Questions & Answers about Hon skulle ha ansträngt sig mer om hon hade vetat.
Why do we use sig here if the subject is hon?
The verb anstränga sig (to make an effort) is a reflexive verb. In Swedish, the third-person reflexive pronoun for both singular (han, hon, den, det) and plural (de) is always sig.
How is the "would have... if..." structure formed in this sentence?
It mirrors English perfectly. The main clause uses skulle ha plus the supine verb form (ansträngt) for "would have made an effort". The conditional part starting with om (if) uses the past perfect: hade plus the supine form (vetat) for "had known".
If I wanted to say she would not have made an effort, where would inte go?
It would go right after the first verb: Hon skulle inte ha ansträngt sig.... In a main clause, sentence adverbs like inte always follow the first conjugated verb, even when there is a long chain of verbs like skulle ha ansträngt.
What if the negation was in the second half of the sentence: "if she had not known"?
It becomes ...om hon inte hade vetat. Because the om phrase is a subordinate clause, it follows a different word order rule: sentence adverbs like inte must come before the first verb (hade).
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