Como quieres …. Started by Newbie jstackiv

[Language Tutors]

Posts: 3

 

 

¿Cómo quieres?

 

 

Started by Newbie jstackiv 1 day ago

 

 

 

There is a great movie where the protagonist always replies to his love, “as you wish,” which in Spanish is, “como quieres,”; but that got me to thinking about the nuances in language, and how that slight difference can make a world of difference. “Como” means both “like” and “as”, and therein lies the question for there is a difference between telling someone, “as you wish,” meaning just that: “as you wish, exactly” and telling someone, “like you wish,” meaning it’s be close enough to call it in the same category, but no, it will not be the same thing. How does one get around that rhetorical hurdle in Spanish or can it not be done and the only avenue to accept is to manipulate it and move on?

[Language Tutors]

I think the answer to your question hinges around the choice of using the subjunctive or the indicative mood.

If you use, ‘como quieres’ you’re being specific and referring to exactly what you know the person wants but if you use the subjunctive it’s more along the lines of ‘whatever you wish, whatever that might be’.

If you’re thinking of ‘The Princess Bride’ perhaps the subjunctive and ‘como desees’ might be a good translation for ‘as you wish’ 😉

 

[Language Tutors]

Lol, I answered decisively?  with ‘might be a good translation’?

Well my reasoning is that ‘desear’ is the verb most commonly used for when it comes to ‘wishing’ – just look at all the idioms that are the equivalent of the English ‘wish’.

Eg.  Be careful what you wish for ….ten cuidado con lo que deseas, death wish = deseo de morir, grant a wish = conceder un deseo etc, etc

Of course wishing and wanting are fairly close in meaning so you could use querer without much change in meaning but personally for ‘wish’ I’d use desear.

[John]

Love that movie.

All right, next question prompted by that then:objectively, how would you differ between desear and querrer? Both their denotations and connotations are all but synonymous, but you answered above decisively, as if it were perfectly clear to you-why such credence?…not that I doubt, but I like to know when I read, let alone say something, that it’s correct and why.

[Author]

Posts