English Translation
If it weren’t for her help, I would not be alive now.
Hello all,
Could we also say:
“Ohne ihre Hilfe, würde ich jetzt nicht mehr am Leben sein.” ?
If so, which version would you say is more common, if any?
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Yes, you could say that. But it doesn’t sound as good.
If you want to look it up, it’s called synthetic vs analytic Konjunktiv 2.
Normally, the “würde + infinitive” is more common. For example, “würde gewinnen” is more common than “gewänne”, which is virtually never used (maybe 100 years ago but not today).[^footnote]
The exception is the verb “sein”. Here, “wäre” is more common than “würde sein”.
[^footnote]: Actually, if you ever read some old-fashioned German literature, like Hermann Hesse, there you could find the opposite, where “gewänne” is still more commonly used than today’s “würde gewinnen”.
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I definitely will 
Right, I felt like I had seen it quite a bit here on clozemaster already, which is kind of why I asked.
I’m glad I did, because that’s very useful information.
Well, let’s put it this way: I’m not quite there yet! - But - if I ever get to that level, I may check some of his works. I quickly read through his Wikipedia page and he seems to be an interesting fellow…
Thank you!
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