Latin Language Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for linguists, teachers, and students wanting to discuss the finer points of the Latin language. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
it's been a few years since I was in a Latin class, but I've been wanting to get a tattoo in the language for a while now, and "Remember death, but do not forget to live" is the phrase I've decided on.
Using what limited knowledge I still have and some googling, I've come up with:
"Memento mori, autem noli oblivisci vivere"
The fact that I'm using two infinitives in a row is setting off my "this is wrong" detectors, and I was hoping someone could guide me in the right direction. Thanks!
Your translation is actually almost perfect. The only small issue is that autem "however" never stands first in its clause; it would be better replaced with sed or at, both of which mean "but".
The reason there are two infinitives in a row is that one way of expressing a negative command is noli plus infinitive, and in this case that infinitive "forget" then takes a further infinitive "live". If you want to avoid this, there are other ways of forming negative commands, such as ne plus subjunctive. This would give:
Memento mori, sed/at ne obliviscaris vivere.
This construction is a bit more poetic in tone, so might also be suitable for that reason. You could play with the word order in various ways, for example with chiasmus:
Memento mori, sed/at vivere ne obliviscaris.
