Breakdown of O ne plak ne kaset dinliyordu.
o
that / he / she / it
dinlemek
to listen
ne... ne
neither (in 'ne... ne...' neither... nor)
kaset
cassette
plak
vinyl record
Questions & Answers about O ne plak ne kaset dinliyordu.
How do we get the 'was listening' meaning in dinliyordu?
The verb dinliyordu combines two endings. First, the present continuous -iyor gives the ongoing action. Then, the past tense ending -du adds the past meaning. Together, they form the past continuous tense for a 'he/she/it' subject.
Why does the 'e' from the verb root dinle change in dinliyordu?
The dictionary form is dinlemek (to listen), so the root is dinle. When a verb root ends in a wide vowel like a or e, that vowel narrows to ı, i, u, or ü when the -iyor suffix is attached. Here, the e turns into an i.
The sentence means she was NOT listening to them. Why isn't the verb negative?
The Turkish structure ne ... ne ... means 'neither ... nor ...'. Because this structure already carries a negative meaning, the verb must be in the affirmative form. Saying dinlemiyordu here would create an unnatural double negative.
English uses 'listening to', so why don't plak and kaset have any endings?
In Turkish, the verb dinlemek takes a direct object, not a directional ending like 'to'. Because the sentence refers to records and cassettes in a general, indefinite way, they stay in their bare dictionary form without any object endings.
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