¡Que lindo¡ o ¡Qué lindo!

Question

I was feeling confused about whether or not there should be a tilde on the e when using que as an exclamation, so I decided to double check it in the SD dictionary. No wonder I was confused! The SD dictionary shows it both ways.

Here is a link to the entry for Que in the SD dictionary.

1. (en oraciones exclamativas)

• •¡que te diviertas! -> have fun!

• •¡que te doy un bofetón! -> do that again and I'll slap you!

• •¿no vas a venir? — ¡que sí! -> aren't you coming? — of course I am!

• •¿pero de verdad no quieres venir? — ¡que no! -> but do you really not want to come? — definitely not!

• •¡que me dejes! -> just leave me alone!

Copyright @2006 Chambers Harrap Publishers Limited

Then below that it says:

¡Qué de gente -> what a lot of people!

Note.—Que in interrogatory or exclamatory use receives the accent to distinguish it from the relative and the conjunction. See the examples.Conj. Not translated.Adj. interr. What.

Velazquez Spanish and English Dictionary. copyright 2007 by Velazquez Press.

So can anyone please tell me which is correct? Or are they both acceptable?

Gracias for your clarifications.

exclamation, not explanation - 0074b507, Aug 30, 2010

And just to point it out as Lazarus states ¡Que lindo! is incorrect. It is ¡Qué lindo! You will see both que and qué used in exclamatory phrases, but they are not interchangeable - 0074b507, Aug 30, 2010

oops! you are right qfreed, I did mean to say exclamation. Gracias for your helping to make this clear for me. - sagiia, Aug 30, 2010

Answer 1

In exclamatory and interrogative sentences you can have QUE and QUÉ, but they mean different things and they are stressed differently. "Que" is pronounced in a slightly descending intonation, pretty much like any other word, whereas "qué" is pronounced with a sharp ascending intonation and a lot of stress. If could hear two sentences,each one with a type of word, you'll see the difference immediately. Now, if you can't hear it, you'll have to understand what they mean, or translate them into English. The parts in brackets are implicit in the sentences, and although they are often not said, they are there to clarify why we start a sentence with "que" (that), which in English would be wrong unless you added the part in brackets. The translations into English are very literal to illustrate how the Spanish part works -they are not intended to be good translations:

QUE (= that):

• ¡(Espero) Que te diviertas! -> ¡(I hope) that you have fun (= Have fun!)

• ¡(Si continúas así el resultado es) que te doy un bofetón! -> (If you continue, the result is) that I slap you!

• ¡(Te he dicho) que me dejes! -> (I have told you) that you leave me! (= just leave me alone!)

• ¡(Te he dicho) Que no! -> (I have told you) that no (= Absolutely not)

QUÉ (= how, what)

• ¡Qué bonito! -> How beautiful!

• ¡Qué (cantidad) de gente -> What (amount) of people!

• ¿Qué quieres? -> What (do you) want?

• ¿Qué habrá querido decir? -> What did he/she mean by that? (this is not literal)

Excellent post! I had wondered about Que usage for a long time. - pesta, Aug 30, 2010

L, it looks like QUE (= that) is used when there is a verb, stated or implied, in the sentence, and QUÉ (= how, what) is used when there is no verb or when the sentence is a question. Do I have it right? - revmaf, Aug 30, 2010

Hoy apriendo de algo más. ¡Qué bueno! Gracias, lazarus, y Spanishdict. - canicos, Aug 30, 2010

¡Qué maravilloso! Ahora, muchas gracias a Lazarus, y con la ayuda de Jeremias y Qfreed, entiendo cuando debo usar qué y que. Espero que en el futuro hiciere usarlos correctamente gracias a ustedes. - sagiia, Aug 30, 2010

Answer 2

Did you mean to type "qué as an 'explanation' or "qué as an exclamation?"

Qué as an exclamatory advervb is always with the tilde.

In your first set of examples, que is used as a conjunction: (Espero) que te diviertas o (Espero) que me dejes...

Or to mean generally "that" Que sí o que no...

But when qué is used as an interrogative pronoun - qué tal? - or an exclamatory adverb

¡Qué linda!

Then it needs the tilde. Again, the examples you gave are not contradictory, they exemplify different uses of qué / que but are consistent.

Does this make sense?

J

Gracias Jeremias, tu repuesta también me ayuda mucho. Y tienes razon: quería decir exclamación. Hice un error en la pregunta. - sagiia, Aug 30, 2010

Answer 3

first i was thinking that qué was used only for questions but then I saw ; ¡Qué va! but I think here or in this kind of sentence it's the word "what" it's not "that" so I think é is more correct.

I hope this question helped you as much as it did for me. Thanks for chiming in. - sagiia, Aug 30, 2010