Now I Am Become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds — J. Robert Oppenheimer

Oppenheimer famously quoted this from The Bhagavad Geeta in the context of the nuclear bomb. The way this sentence is structured feels weird to me. “Now I am Death” or “Now I have become Death” sound much more natural in English to me.

Was he trying to simulate some formulation in Sanskrit that is not available in the English language?

  • pianoplant@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    If you think about it the fact that modern English uses “Have” in this context (primarily describing something you own) is actually weirder than “Am” (something you are)