Word order

[bellezzarubata.livejournal.com]

Typically, I can squeak by with what I feel sounds correct but I was writing an email and couldn't decide whether  "Cкоро yвидимься" or  "Увидимься cкоро" was correct. 

Which is correct? Or does it matter.  If it does, can anyone explain why?

Thanks!

Comments

[krivoshey.livejournal.com]

"Cкоро yвидимся", or "увидимся", or "до скорого". But "до скорой встречи" would be better, I think.

[bellezzarubata.livejournal.com]

Thank you

[konstkaras.livejournal.com]

Both are correct (without ь!), but first (being more informal) is more suitable as a greeting for end of the letter, and second as an information that your meeting will be soon.

[bellezzarubata.livejournal.com]

Really? I really thought I heard the pause for ь. Hm.

That explanation is great, thanks so much!

[konstkaras.livejournal.com]

Don't let it confuse you. Ь doesn't mean any pause, it means softness of previous consonant. Some people still speak in older way when a consonant brings shares its softness with immediately previous one; some people don't, but this "extra softness" is never written.
And this is no grammatical reason to write ь: this is увидим - a werb увидеть in future tense, 2nd person - with reflexive(reciprocal) particle -ся

[bellezzarubata.livejournal.com]

I understand the sound ь makes, I just tend to hear it where it's not, occasionally.

[konstkaras.livejournal.com]

ь does NOT make any sound! It just a)make previous consonant soft; and b) make a following vowel, if it's я, е, ё, ю or и be read with [й] sound before (that is, as in start of a word, except for и).

[bellezzarubata.livejournal.com]

That's what I meant...except for the rules, that I wouldn't have known off the top of my head. ; )

[archaicos.livejournal.com]

The "pause" is usually made with ъ, not ь.

ъ is used to separate the preceding consonant from blending with the following vowel (e.g. объект, объём, объяснять, дизъюнкция).

ь softens the preceding consonant similarly to what happens to an L when an Indian says "I will tell you". It may appear like ь also makes a pause because just like ъ it prevents the consonant from blending with the following vowel (if any, e.g. барьер, варьировать, бульон, компьютер, бегунья; also note that consonant+ьо is effectively pronounced as consonant+ьё, and и in consonant+ьи is pronounced as the first vowel sound in yield).

At any rate, depending on the mood of the speaker there may be pauses between sounds in a word. Don't take all of them for ь and ъ.

[pitsot.livejournal.com]

First, "увидимся" instead of "увидимься"

In Russian the order of words is not that important, so "скоро увидимся" and "увидимся скоро" have quite the same meaning

But, "до встречи" sounds more natural.

[bellezzarubata.livejournal.com]

I haven't heard that one until now, I'll have to remember. Thank you

Syntax

[nikitapopovich.livejournal.com]

The Russian language generally doesn’t like verbs at the end of a sentence. There is, however, at least one widespread exception, namely when a sentence consists of just two elements: «Где Володя»? «Скоро придет». «Давно не видел Диму». «Завтра увидишь».

The fact that Russian word order is flexible usually makes it difficult for learners to get the knack of how to construct sentences with the emphasis they intend. «Молодая девушка в оборванном пальто не спеша указала мне дорогу в деревню». If you turn that around, putting the subject at the end, the subject comes in for emphasis, with English needing to start off with an expletive to capture the nuance: «Не спеша указала мне дорогу в деревню молодая девушка в оборванном пальто». «It was a young girl in a tattered coat who…»

Syntax, in my opinion, requires a lot of practice in writing with the help of a patient native Russian who is aware of the difficulties for a foreigner and never tires of pointing the learner in the right direction.

Anthony