se me ha quemado el café
could we remove 'me' from the sentence?
se me ha quemado el café
2 Answers
Yes, but then the coffee was burnt by somebody else or some other reason....
That "me" means that it was you who burnt the coffee.
Let's compare three similar expressions that can be used to indicate varying degrees of responsibility on the part of the speaker.
Se ha quemado el café
This expression simply tells us that "the coffee has been burned." This expression lacks any explicit implication as to who, in fact, might have burned the coffee.
He quemado el café
This expression tells us that it was "I who burned the coffee." Here, the implication is placed squarely on the shoulders of the speaker as being the cause or agent who actively caused the coffee to burn.
Se me ha quemado el café
This expression is a sort of intermediary between the two expressions above. Like the first [removed]Se ha quemado el café), there is an acknowledgement that the coffee has burned, but the use of the indirect object pronoun "me" adds an slight implication that the speaker was involved in the coffee being burned.
The primary difference between the latter two expressions is that when the speaker is the subject of the verb, as with "He quemado," it is clear that the speaker is directly involved in burning the coffee; whereas, when the indirect object pronoun is used to refer to the speaker, the effect is that the speaker is implying a less direct involvement (i.e. less responsibility) for the coffee having burned.
