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"Mir gefalle am besten das Hafenfest, das im Juni findet statt." or "Mir gefällt am besten das Hafenfest, das im Juni stattfindet."?

My grammar textbook tells me that the latter is true but I don't understand why. Could someone explain why it is "Mir gefällt" instead of "Mir gefalle" when Mir is the first person dative pronoun which should take the first person form of the verb and hence be "gefalle"? also, how do I know that "stattfindet" is the correct word to use and not "findet statt"?

  • Why do you think a first person (dative) object implies a first person verb form? – DonHolgo Sep 10 '21 at 13:05
  • Is there always a subject/object switch when we are dealing with the verb gefallen? which other German verbs behave this way? is there a list? –  Sep 10 '21 at 15:19
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    The subject/object switch does only takes place in comparison to the English verb "to like". The English verb "to please" works the same way as gefallen. – RHa Sep 10 '21 at 17:58
  • You already know that “mir” is not the subject, because it is dative. – Carsten S Sep 11 '21 at 01:06

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There are really two questions here. This first one is about the verb gefallen, which is similar to the English like, but there is a subject/object switch between the German and English verbs which is confusing if you're not used to it. The question linked in the comments covers this issue.

The other question is about the verb stattfinden, which is a separable verb so you would usually encounter it in the form findet ... statt. But in the sentence given it occurs in a relative clause, a type of dependent clause, and dependent clauses follow the VL (verb last) sentence plan rather than V2 plan seen in independent and main clauses. When both parts of a separable verb move to the end of a clause, the parts combine, so that the prefix (statt) that is normally separated becomes a prefix once again and you get stattfindet. The parts of a separable verb recombine in a dependent clause, as it does here, and in the infinitive. The verb stattfinden is rather unusual for a separable verb because statt isn't normally used as a verb prefix. But some prefixes just aren't used very often; you just have to keep in mind that it's possible that you're dealing with a separable verb when you see bits of a sentence in odd seeming places. (Odd seeming to an English speaker, that is.)

RDBury
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    Maybe it's helpful to compare "gefallen" not so much to "to like", but to "to please". "Das Hafenfest gefällt mir am besten" would be "the harbor festival pleases me the best" or "the harbor festival pleases me most". – Henning Kockerbeck Sep 10 '21 at 14:07
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    Is there always a subject/object switch when we are dealing with the verb gefallen? which other German verbs behave this way? is there a list? –  Sep 10 '21 at 14:28
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    @Henning Kockerbeck: Yes, it's might help to phrase it as "to please", or, in order to capture the dative flavor, "to be pleasing to". So Mir gefällt dein Kleid, becomes "Your dress is pleasing to me." That captures the German grammar, but it's not very idiomatic English. – RDBury Sep 10 '21 at 22:42
  • @StackExchangeGerman: It seems gefallen has some additional meanings, but in the sense used here, comparing gefallen with "to like", there is a subject object switch. But that depends on which word you choose as a translation; as Henning Kockerbeck pointed out, if you use "please" instead then there is no switch. It's not a property of the German verb but of the word in English you choose to translate it. Another example is fürchten; if you translate it as "frighten" then there's a subject/object switch, but if you use "fear" then there's not. – RDBury Sep 10 '21 at 23:16