Breakdown of Okružen je ljudima, ali njega nitko ne razumije.
biti
to be (sam, si, je)
on
he
ljudi
people
ne
no, not
ali
but (strong contrast)
razumjeti
to understand
nitko
nobody
okružen
surrounded
Questions & Answers about Okružen je ljudima, ali njega nitko ne razumije.
Why does the word for "people" take the form ljudima here?
Ljudima is the instrumental case of ljudi (the highly irregular plural of čovjek, meaning "man" or "person"). We use the instrumental case without a preposition here because it shows the agent or means of the passive adjective okružen (surrounded by people).
Why use the long pronoun njega instead of the short word ga?
The long form njega is used here for emphasis. The sentence sets up a strong contrast: he is around all these people, but him specifically, nobody understands. If you used the short clitic ga, it wouldn't carry that emphatic weight and would also have to follow strict word-order rules.
Why is there a ne before razumije if nitko already means "nobody"?
This is a great reminder about Croatian double negation. Whenever you have a negative word like nitko (nobody) or ništa (nothing) in a sentence, the main verb must also be negative. Literally, this sentence says "...but him nobody doesn't understand."
What form is okružen in, and why?
Okružen is a passive adjective meaning "surrounded". It is in the nominative masculine singular form because it describes the implied subject "he" (which we know is singular and masculine from the English translation and the use of the masculine pronoun njega later in the sentence).
Learn Okružen je ljudima, ali njega nitko ne razumije and more in Croatian
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free