More Briusov

[joliecanard.livejournal.com]

Could you please clear up these two lines for me?

Неужели искру рая
Погасить и встретить ночь?

I do not understand why the infinitive is used, and therefore can't make out the syntax. What exactly is he saying?

Comments

[oryx_and_crake]

It is a "personless" or "subjectless" sentense (I am not sure what is a proper term in English)
E.g. Неужели я должен умереть? -> Неужели мне умереть? - those two have the same meaning though different sentence structure. Same in Bryusov's poem. Неужели (мне) искру рая погасить и встретить ночь? is the same as Неужели я должен погасить искру рая и встретить ночь?

[object.livejournal.com]

I think it's the same sort of infinitive as in "to be or not to be".

Все ясно

[joliecanard.livejournal.com]

Thanks. Turns out that I had been thinking about he wrong interpretation of Неужели because when you translate it into English, it changes meaning in each context. So that's what confused me.

And the correct term in English is impersonal sentence.

[joliecanard.livejournal.com]

Excellent, thanks.

Re: Все ясно

[oryx_and_crake]

Thanks for terminology clarification.

[tani4.livejournal.com]

it's impersonal sentence
like "to be or not to be?" :))