Read to me.

Question

How would a person ask someone to read to them?

I want the Spanish translation for:

"Read to me."

Hi pgzerrate and welcome to the forum. I have edited your title to reflect forum guidelines (Avoid phrases like "translation please", "how do I say this", etc) Thanks and again - welcome! - Izanoni1, Nov 29, 2009

Answer 1

Lea a mi, lee me, lea para mi, leer para mi. Which one best asks: Read to me. Not read it to me. This is a child asking a parent to "read to me".

You need the indirect object pronoun "me" because the child is not receiving the action of the verb (i.e. she is not asking to be read but to be read "to" or that the parent read "for" her). See the post above that includes the quote from Paralee's reference article on the indirect object pronoun. No matter what construction you use, the verb is going to have to be accompanied by the indirect object pronoun "me."

You could use the imperative to make a direct command such as:

Léamelo un cuento, por favor - read me a story please

where me represents the i.o. (to me) and lo represents the d.o. (a story/it). If you were to say this then the "lo" would be optional and you could say:

Léame un cuento, por favor - read me a story, please.

If you simply want to say "read to me" without any implication of what to read, you could say:

Léame, por favor or Léame a mí, por favor - read to me please

To make a more polite/less demanding request, the child could also say:

¿Podría leermelo un cuento, por favor? - Could you please read me a story?

¿A mí me lo podría leer un cuento, por favor? - Could you please read me a story?

The difference here is the placement of the object pronouns, but the meaning does not change. For a simple polite request to read to me, the child might say:

¿Podría leerme?/¿A mí me podría leer?/¿me podría leer? - Could you read to me?

Each of these says pretty much the same thing except when you use the prepositional pronoun "A mí" it places the emphasis on the speaker "can you read to ME?"

Hopefully, this helped and didn't just complicate things for you.

This is exactly the information I needed. Thank you! - pgzerrate, Nov 29, 2009

There is a possibility the "lea para mí " has no i.o. and therefore, would not require the "me". Heiditas says that the para prepositional phrase is not accepted by all grammarians as an i.o., so no i.o.p. is necessary. - - 0074b507, Nov 30, 2009

Answer 2

"Léalo a mi, porfavor." This means "Read it to me, please"

"Lea a mi, porfavor" "Read to me, please"

These sentences seem to have an i.o. Do they need the redundant i.o.p.?

Léamelo a mí, por favor.

Léame a mí, por favor.

Whoops! I think it's time for me to go to bed since I seem to be messing things up, thanks Qfreed! - LAtINaPunKROcKerAConFundidA, Nov 29, 2009

Answer 3

Lea a mi, lee me, lea para mi, leer para mi. Which one best asks: Read to me. Not read it to me. This is a child asking a parent to "read to me".

Answer 4

If there is an indirect object there must be an indirect object pronoun (me) included:

Léamelo a mí, por favor. - Read it to me please (emphasis on the I.O.)

Léamelo, por favor. - Read it to me please

Great minds... - 0074b507, Nov 29, 2009

About the 2nd one: Spanish doesn't require a d.o. to have an i.o. as English does. - 0074b507, Nov 29, 2009

Answer 5

This is from Paralee's reference article indirect object pronouns

When to Use the Indirect Object Pronoun

If there is an indirect object in a sentence, there MUST be an indirect object pronoun! You can also have the prepositional phrase "para nosotros" or "a Miguel" to add emphasis, but you can NOT only have the prepositional phrase.

From what I have read elsewhere on the subject this explanation is correct. For example, you could say "A mí me gusta las fresas" or "me gusta las fresas" but never "A mí gusta las fresas" or "gusta las fresas a mí"

Answer 6

"Léalo a mi, porfavor." This means "Read it to me, please"

"Lea a mi, porfavor" "Read to me, please"