Breakdown of Resim yapmak ve okumak güzel.
güzel
beautiful / nice / good
okumak
to read
resim yapmak
to draw, to paint
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Questions & Answers about Resim yapmak ve okumak güzel.
Why does the Turkish sentence use yapmak and okumak instead of -ing words for drawing and reading?
In Turkish, the infinitive form of a verb (ending in -mak or -mek) acts as a verbal noun. This means it works exactly like words ending in "-ing" in English. So okumak translates to both "to read" and "reading".
Why is "drawing" translated as two words, resim yapmak?
Turkish often combines a noun and a helper verb to create a new action. There isn't a single everyday verb for "to draw". Instead, you say resim yapmak, which literally translates to "picture making" or "to make a picture".
Both verbs here use -mak. When would I use -mek instead?
It follows the rules of vowel harmony. You look at the last vowel of the verb root. Both yap- (a) and oku- (u) have "back" vowels, so they take -mak. If the verb root had a "front" vowel, like gel- (e) or git- (i), it would take -mek (gelmek, gitmek).
Where is the word for "are" in this sentence?
In Turkish, the "to be" verb (am/is/are) is often completely left out for third-person subjects (like he, she, it, or general concepts). Just placing the adjective güzel at the end of the sentence is enough to mean "are nice".