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C'est la femme sans qui il ne peut pas vivre.

C'est la femme sans qui il ne peut pas vivre.
She is the woman he cannot live without.
From Lesson 241:Relative clauses with prepositions (à qui, avec qui)·French

Questions & Answers about C'est la femme sans qui il ne peut pas vivre.

Why does the French sentence say sans qui instead of ending with the preposition like in English?
In English, we often put prepositions at the end of a relative clause (the woman he cannot live without). French strictly forbids this! The preposition must always come immediately before the relative pronoun. So, you literally have to phrase it as the woman without whom (la femme sans qui).
Since femme is feminine, could I say sans laquelle instead of sans qui?
Yes, sans laquelle is grammatically correct. However, when referring to people, using a preposition + qui is much more common and sounds more natural in everyday French. Forms of lequel and laquelle are mostly used for things, or to avoid confusion if there are multiple nouns in the sentence.
The English translation is "She is", so why does the French start with C'est instead of Elle est?
This is a classic rule to remember: use c'est when introducing a noun that has an article in front of it (like un, une, le, or la). Because we have la femme, it must be C'est. You only use Elle est before an adjective or a profession without an article (like Elle est médecin).
Just to be sure, why do ne and pas go around peut instead of vivre?
When you use a conjugated verb followed by an infinitive (like peut + vivre), the two parts of the negation (ne and pas) always "hug" the conjugated verb. You will never place pas after the infinitive.

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