viel Wirbel um nichts machen
to make a big fuss about nothing
Origin
The phrase is a variant of 'viel Lärm um nichts', the German title of Shakespeare's comedy 'Much Ado About Nothing' (c. 1598/99); here 'Wirbel' (commotion) colloquially replaces 'Lärm' (noise). The proverbial expression has detached itself from the play's title.
Building blocks
Words in this expression
Grammar that uses this word
- Simple past 'musste' (had to, from müssen)Präteritum 'musste' (müssen)
- Perfect tense of separable verbs (hat aufgemacht)Perfekt trennbarer Verben
- Subordinate clause with 'weil' (because, causal)Nebensatz mit 'weil' (Kausalsatz)
- Subordinate clause with 'wenn' (if/when, temporal/conditional)Nebensatz mit 'wenn' (temporal/konditional)
- Indefinite pronoun 'nichts' (nothing)Indefinitpronomen 'nichts'
- Conjunctional adverb 'deshalb' (therefore)Konjunktionaladverb 'deshalb'
Examples
Wegen eines vergessenen Kommas macht sie um .
She always makes a big fuss about nothing over a forgotten comma.