Breakdown of آیا او ادبیات کلاسیک را دوست داشت؟
او
he/she
آیاâyâ
whether (question particle)
دوست داشتنdust dâshtan
to like / to love
راrâ
definite direct object marker
Questions & Answers about آیا او ادبیات کلاسیک را دوست داشت؟
Why use آیا at the start of this sentence?
While spoken Farsi usually just uses a rising tone of voice to make a statement into a question, آیا is used in formal or written Farsi to explicitly mark a yes/no question. This fits the slightly more formal topic of classical literature.
Why is the object marker را placed after کلاسیک instead of the main noun ادبیات?
The post-position را marks the specific direct object of a verb. When the object is a full noun phrase containing adjectives, like ادبیات کلاسیک (classical literature), را always goes at the very end of the entire phrase.
Since this lesson is about the formal reflexive pronoun خویش, could we use it in this sentence?
Not in this exact sentence. خویش (khish) means oneself or one's own and reflects back to the subject. Because the subject here is just liking classical literature in general, not specifically her own classical literature, there is no place for a reflexive possessive here.
What tense is the verb دوست داشت?
It is the simple past tense of the compound verb دوست داشتن (to like). Because the subject is او (she), it uses the third-person singular form, which has no ending attached to the past stem داشت.