Perfectly Imperfectible

Professor Polakiewicz will offer one more two-year cycle of Polish language instruction at the University, after which, it will likely be taught no more forever. Not a particularly “popular” second-language selection, rather difficult, and no longer a “critical” language as defined by national defense authorities—that is, the language of a Communist or terrorist enemy—the future of formal Polish language-learning seems dimmer, even dim. The future of informal Polish language-learning is another question altogether, and insofar as it depends on me, while not particularly bright, burning hard or gemlike, its future will at least smolder on, flickeringly.

My immediate goals for informal language learning are three: consolidate my current grammar, expand my vocabulary, and devise a working set of idioms for my own personal use (personal, yes, as in “idiosyncratic” and not, I trust, “idiotic”). In fact, I have begun on all three counts. Cross-referencing Oscar Swan’s First Year Polish, Polakiewicz’s Supplemental Materials for First Year Polish, and Janecki’s 301 Polish Verbs, I can assemble a table of 500 verbs for memorizing. As I peruse their conjugation and usage, I will have occasion to review and study at greater leisure the grammar of verbs, for example, aspect. You will recall that Polish verbs tend to come in pairs: the first imperfective, indicating that the action is in process, ongoing, repeated or habitual; and a second aspect which focuses on the completion of an action, known as perfective. Interestingly, as I page through my texts I discover fifteen imperfective verbs that have no perfective counterpart. How can this be? What does this mean? That 5% of Polish verbs cannot be perfected? That 5% of Polish activities cannot be completed?

bać się—“to be afraid”

działać—“to function, operate, work”

musieć—“to have to, must”

narzekać—“to complain”

podróżować—“to travel”

polegać—“to depend upon, rely on”

potrzebować—“to need”

sądzić—“to judge, believe, think”

spodziewać—“to expect, hope for, anticipate”

śnić—“to dream”

towarzyszyć—“to accompany, attend, follow”

uczęszczać—“to frequent”

walczyć—“to fight”

woleć—“to prefer”

zawdzięczać—“to owe, be indebted”

Reflecting on the verbs themselves, I love to suppose that the quiet, constant linguistic process itself has recognized and/or decreed that these activities—being afraid, working, being compelled to, complaining (heavens, yes!), traveling, needing, relying upon others, judging but never quite condemning, hoping, hoping, dreaming, accompanying and attending, fighting (of course, alas), preferring, and being indebted to someone are habitual to Poles, ceaseless, always in process, never, ever done.  Janecki observes that "There are also a few simple imperfective verbs that do not come in a perfective aspect.” (xiv) She does not say why. Polakiewicz, who knows his Slavic linguistics pretty thoroughly, would probably answer, “that’s just the way it is in Polish.”