Breakdown of Küçük kedi süt istiyor.
kedi
cat
küçük
small
süt
milk
istemek
to want / to require / to call for
Questions & Answers about Küçük kedi süt istiyor.
Why is the verb istiyor instead of 'isteyor'?
The root of the verb is iste- (to want). When we add the present continuous suffix -yor, a special rule kicks in for verbs ending in the vowels a or e. The -yor suffix 'narrows' these wide vowels. Following vowel harmony rules, the e in iste- narrows to an i, making it istiyor.
The suffix -yor usually means an action happening right now, so why is it translated as 'wants' instead of 'is wanting'?
In English, certain verbs like 'want' or 'love' are rarely used in the '-ing' continuous form. Turkish does not have this restriction. The present continuous -yor is perfectly natural here to express what the cat wants right now, but we translate it to the simple present 'wants' to sound natural in English.
Why doesn't süt (milk) have a case ending on it, like 'sütü'?
We only add the specific direct object ending (the accusative case) when talking about a specific item, like 'the milk'. Because the cat just wants milk in general, süt stays in its plain dictionary form.
How does the word order here compare to English?
This sentence perfectly shows the standard Turkish word order: Subject (küçük kedi), Object (süt), and Verb (istiyor). While English uses Subject-Verb-Object, Turkish places the verb at the very end.