Ли (часть вторая)

by Don  

Previously we discussed the particle ли, which turns a statement into a question, and we noted that ли must occur as the second item in the sentence. All our example sentences had a single word before ли. It turns out that certain phrases, that is, groups of more than one word, can be the first item before ли. First of all, prepositional phrases can come before ли:

В Африке ли живут кенгуру? Is it in Africa that kangaroos live?
До войны ли вы жили в Париже? Was it before the war that you lived in Paris?

The negative particle не is also a clitic, that is, it is pronounced as part of the word that follows it; unlike ли, it is a proclitic, that is, it is pronounced as part of the word before which it appears. When it combines with a prepositional phrase or other word, the whole unit can occur before ли:

Не в Москве ли родился Путин? Wasn't Putin born in Moscow?
— Не Пушкин ли написал «Гамлета»?
— Да что ты, «Гамлета» написал Шекспир.
“Wasn't it Pushkin who wrote Hamlet?”
“Oh, come on, Hamlet was written by Shakespeare.”

This is very common with certain politness phrases:

Не хотите ли вы чая? Would you like some tea?

And you can even add a бы to the sentences to make them even more polite:

Не хотели ли бы вы чая? Would you happen to care for some tea?
Не смогли ли бы вы помочь мне? Could you be so kind as to help me?

Notice the word order here: не comes before the verb. Ли comes immediately after the verb. Бы comes immediately after ли. The subject pronoun comes immediately after бы. No other word order works in these contexts.

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