Me da devuelve

Question

Simpsons again. Homer drops a heavy case of pennies and they break through the ground. He yells in the hole, "Oiga, China, me da devuelve". His intent is pretty clear, give it back...... but it seems weird without the direct object, and with two verbas like that. Seems like "devuelvelo" would work better (devolver means return so "me da devuelve seems really wierd and redundant) , is "me da devuelve" a correct way to say it? Gracias.

Answer 1

Are you sure it wasn't "Oiga, China, me la devuelve"? Sometimes the object pronoun appears before an imperative verb (even though it's not exactly grammatically correct). I think I've usually seen that when the command looks more like a subjunctive statement: "¡Oiga! ¡Que me la devuelve!"

that would make a lot more sense ;) - jeezzle, Aug 15, 2010

Answer 2

Don't we do it in English too? Imagine you're in the school yard, someone's just stolen your ball - you hold out your hand and say - "give it back, give it!' or some such double order for emphasis.

Not grammatically correct perhaps but gets the point across.