# И теперь



## wonlon

This question follows from my last thread. A man found his career as a reporter. Here it comes:

Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги за "писанье". Мать и теперь говорит: "У тебя, сынок, работа нетруданая - тяжелее карандаша ничего не поднимаешь.

Mum could not believe that I can earn money _(за+ acc.) because of ??_ writing. Mum even?? now always says "My little son, you have an easy job ...???

1. (...)

2. (...)

3. Does  и emphasize теперь?


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## Honeythunder

Here "И теперь" means "still", "now too". "Мать теперь говорит" would mean that she is just talking about smth. presently. "Мать и теперь говорит"  means that she has been talking about it since some point in the past and still does it. You can say: "Она и раньше так говорила, и теперь так говорит".
Hope this helps!


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## horace.mik

wonlon said:


> Does  и emphasize теперь?


"и" doesn't emphasise "теперь". "и теперь" can be emphasised by your voice! It simply means "and now".


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## Enquiring Mind

"Even now, mum says ....".   There's no 'always' in the Russian.


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## learnerr

Enquiring Mind said:


> "Even now, mum says ....".   There's no 'always' in the Russian.


Right, it is left implicit. "Always" or "usually".


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## wonlon

horace.mik said:


> "и" doesn't emphasise "теперь". "и теперь" can be emphasised by your voice! It simply means "and now".


But I always think that if и is not natural to be translated as the connective "and", then it must be a particle to emphasize the following word.


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## Maroseika

wonlon said:


> But I always think that if и is not natural to be translated as the connective "and", then it must be a particle to emphasize the following word.



Actually situation is more complicated, because "и" can work as a conjunction, but not translated as "and"*. However in the present case "и" really can be translated like "and":
Мать и теперь говорит presumes that Мать говорила раньше и теперь тоже говорит.



*Like in the Concessive constructions where it means "хотя".


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## learnerr

wonlon said:


> But I always think that if и is not natural to be translated as the connective "and", then it must be a particle to emphasize the following word.


As a side note, I have a feeling that when people talk about emphasis, they have a great chance of talking each about different things, feelings and perceptions. To your question, why do you say it is not natural? Here it serves to say, "today as well as before", and it's up to you and to the speaker to decide, how much emphasis this formulation gives to "now".

I'm in fact having difficulty to imagine a context in which the meaning of "и" would not be [at least in part] connective-additive (connection of many things into one thought). Most emphasis is probably given in phrases like "он и говорит, что ...", but here this emphasis exists exactly because the "и" is said to specially connect his action of talking to all our previous thought about him and what happens around him.


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## Enquiring Mind

I hate to disagree with the native speakers on this point, wonlon, but in my opinion in the sequence "Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги  за "писанье". Мать и теперь говорит: "У тебя, сынок, работа нетруданая -  тяжелее карандаша ничего не поднимаешь" и does emphasize теперь, especially because of the word order:
И теперь мать говорит - and now mother says (it might be the first time she has said it)
Мать и теперь говорит - even now, mother says (she has said it before, and she still says it now)


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## learnerr

EM, the emphasis is very optional in this phrase. It depends on perception. You can either pay very much attention that she _still _says that, or leave the fact that she has now the same opinion as before and exactly that opinion without much attention, the phrase by itself does not require or lead into either decision.


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## Maroseika

Enquiring Mind said:


> in my opinion in the sequence "Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги за "писанье". Матьитеперьговорит: "Утебя, сынок, работанетруданая - тяжелеекарандашаничегонеподнимаешь" и does emphasize теперь, especially because of the word order:
> И теперь мать говорит - and now mother says (it might be the first time she has said it)
> Мать и теперь говорит - even now, mother says (she has said it before, and she still says it now)



Compare:



Мать теперь говорит - she says now, but she did not say that before (when she could not believe...). 
 Мать и теперь говорит - she says now as well as used to say before. I.e. she said this before *and *says now. 
 
Word order doesn't change anything in this case"
И теперь мать говорит - it may have at least 2 meanings, and none of them is emphatic:



И refers to the consequnce of the story: Мать сама никогда о нем не заботилась и теперь она требует заботы от него! 
 И refers to теперь (she says now and she said before). 
 
As for emphasizing function of "и", it is realized in a bit different way:

- Может, стоит обратиться в милицию?
- И не думай.

- Ну что, больно было укол делать?
- И совсем даже не больно.


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## Enquiring Mind

Agreed, but (with the greatest of respect, since you are the native speaker here) the emphasizing function of "и" can also be expressed in the way it is in wonlon's text, don't you think?  
Маша сказала *и* Саше об этом.
_Masha even told Sasha about it.
(or) Masha told Sasha about it too.
_А, ваш брат приехал? Я *и* не знал_
Oh, your brother has arrived? I didn't (even) know that. (or "that's something I didn't know")

_"Кое-кто *и* до сих пор говорит, что, мол, независимость легко досталась украинцам..." (source: day.kiev.ua)
_Even now you will hear people saying ..._
In wonlon's sequence, the "и" could be omitted altogether to mean "Now mother says ...".  The "and" as a conjunction is weak in English and, in fact, no conjunction is needed at all because it's a new sentence.  The writer (Leskov) could have said: "Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги за "писанье", и теперь говорит..." if he only wanted a conjunction. However, he chose to start a new sentence and use "и теперь" because it adds something, and I think that in this context it probably reinforces the meaning of теперь.  She has said this before, and she continues to say it even now.   
Do you really think the word order doesn't change anything?

I take learnerr's point in #10 - the emphasis is optional.  If we say the sentence with stress on "*и* те*перь*"  (and the appropriate intonation), it's "even now"; if we see the sentence written down, it's not possible to say for sure whether this emphatic function is there.


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## learnerr

Enquiring Mind said:


> In wonlon's sequence, the "и" could be omitted altogether to mean "Now  mother says ...".  The "and" as a conjunction is weak in English and, in  fact, no conjunction is needed at all because it's a new sentence.The writer (Leskov) could have said: "Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги за "писанье", и теперь говорит chose to add the "и" because it adds something, and I think that in this context it probably reinforces the meaning of теперь.  She has said this before, and she continues to say it even now.


What it adds is simply a logical link between the past and the present. In a way (in English terms), it changes the meaning of "теперь" from "now" to "still". Then, it's up to you whether to reinforce something because of this link or not.
By the way, why do you think the author is Leskov? I didn't find this information in the Internet, and I doubt that the text could be written not in the Soviet period.


Enquiring Mind said:


> Маша сказала *и* Саше об этом.
> _Masha even told Sasha about it.
> (or) Masha told Sasha about it too._


I think it's always the second. I.e. Sasha was informed, too. Or, rather, I would put it very simple and say that the meanings, rendered in the two translations, are the same, but people's reaction at the meaning is stronger in the second translation, they are quite astonished at the fact.


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## Maroseika

Enquiring Mind said:


> Agreed, but (with the greatest of respect, since you are the native speaker here) the emphasizing function of "и" can also be expressed in the way it is in wonlon's text, don't you think?
> Маша сказала *и* Саше об этом.
> _Masha even told Sasha about it.
> (or) Masha told Sasha about it too.
> _


In the first sentence "и" = "even" only in the context and even then it is an addition to its main sense "too". But there are cases where "и" is a mere emphatic particle, like in your following example:



> А, ваш брат приехал? Я *и* не знал_
> Oh, your brother has arrived? I didn't (even) know that. (or "that's something I didn't know")
> 
> _


"Кое-кто *и* до сих пор говорит, что, мол, независимость легко досталась украинцам..." (source: day.kiev.ua)
_Even now you will hear people saying ..._[/QUOTE]
But here again the main sense of "и" is "and": they said this in the past and say this now.



> In wonlon's sequence, the "и" could be omitted altogether to mean "Now mother says ...".  The "and" as a conjunction is weak in English and, in fact, no conjunction is needed at all because it's a new sentence.  The writer (Leskov) could have said: "Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги за "писанье", и теперь говорит..." However, he chose to add the "и" because it adds something, and I think that in this context it probably reinforces the meaning of теперь.  She has said this before, and she continues to say it even now.


I'm afraid I must disagree, without "и" the sense is just the opposite:

Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги  за "писанье". Мать и теперь говорит: "У тебя, сынок, работа нетрудная".
...Mother [said in the past and] says now too: "...".

Мать не могла поверить, что я могу получать деньги  за "писанье", и теперь говорит: "У тебя, сынок, работа нетрудная".
...Mother now says: "...". [It is only now that she says this].


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## learnerr

Maroseika said:


> In the first sentence "и" = "even" only in the context and even then it is an addition to its main sense "too". But there are cases where "и" is a mere emphatic particle, like in your following example:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> А, ваш брат приехал? Я *и* не знал_
> Oh, your brother has arrived? I didn't (even) know that. (or "that's something I didn't know")_
Click to expand...

_And even_ here the main meaning of "и" being a conjunction that serves to add something is still preserved, just little noticeable. He means that it's _not only_ _just _a fact, but _also_ a fact he didn't know about; this is where the emphasis comes from into mind. For example, this "и не знал" construction corroborates well with the word "кстати", which also serves to add new facts for consideration:

- А почему он этого не сделал?
- Он никак не мог этого сделать. Он, кстати, и не знал, что это нужно сделать.


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## Enquiring Mind

Sorry, my mistake, according to this page (pdf file), which I found earlier on, it's an easy reader adaptation of a piece written by a journalist called Василий *П*есков ( - "известнейший русский журналист нашей эпохи", it says here {halfway down the page}). (So nothing to do with the illustrious Nikolai *L*eskov).


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## learnerr

Enquiring Mind said:


> Do you really think the word order doesn't change anything?


It does (the two meanings listed by Maroseika are different than what we have), but it does not change considerably the matter of emphasis, which is a very hard to define notion here, because we can't emphasise different meanings in the same way (thus "considerably", i.e. not in a way that would be worthy consideration).


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## wonlon

Enquiring Mind said:


> Sorry, my mistake, according to this page (pdf file), which I found earlier on, it's an easy reader adaptation of a piece written by a journalist called Василий *П*есков ( - "известнейший русский журналист нашей эпохи", it says here {halfway down the page}). (So nothing to do with the illustrious Nikolai *L*eskov).


I am digesting the answers from you all.
I saw p.29 of the pdf. and this is exactly the text I am reading, except that my text omitted the paragraph "В сибирском тайге..." and my text does not mention the author.


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