Breakdown of Si tu es amoureux de quelqu'un, parle-lui honnêtement.
Questions & Answers about Si tu es amoureux de quelqu'un, parle-lui honnêtement.
In French, when the object is a person introduced by à, you usually replace à + person with an indirect object pronoun.
- parler à quelqu’un → lui parler (to talk to him/her)
- In the imperative, that becomes: parle-lui (talk to him/her)
So instead of parle à lui, which sounds wrong in standard French, you say parle-lui.
Lui already includes the idea of à.
In the affirmative imperative, object pronouns are attached to the verb with a hyphen:
- Parle-lui. – Talk to him/her.
- Donne-moi ça. – Give me that.
- Écris-nous. – Write to us.
In other tenses and moods, there is no hyphen, and the pronoun goes before the verb:
- Tu lui parles. – You talk to him/her.
- Tu me donnes ça. – You give me that.
So the hyphen is a normal rule for the affirmative imperative with pronouns.
This is because the verb is in the imperative, not the present tense.
- Present with tu: tu parles (with -s)
- Imperative with tu: parle (no -s) for most -er verbs
For regular -er verbs, the tu form of the imperative drops the final -s:
- Tu regardes → Regarde ! – Look!
- Tu écoutes → Écoute ! – Listen!
- Tu parles → Parle ! – Speak!
Exception: when the verb is followed by y or en in the affirmative imperative, you keep the -s for pronunciation:
- Parles-en ! – Talk about it!
- Vas-y ! – Go on!
In French, after si (if) for a real, possible condition, you usually use the present tense, not the future:
- Si tu es amoureux… – If you are in love…
- Si tu as le temps, viens. – If you have time, come.
- Si tu veux, on peut sortir. – If you want, we can go out.
French does not say:
- ✗ Si tu seras amoureux… – incorrect in this kind of sentence
Here, the main clause is in the imperative: parle-lui honnêtement.
So the pattern is: si + present, then imperative (or future, or present), but not future after si.
The adjective amoureux (in love) is followed by the preposition de:
- être amoureux de quelqu’un – to be in love with someone
You never say amoureux à quelqu’un.
Some examples:
- Elle est amoureuse de Paul. – She is in love with Paul.
- Ils sont amoureux l’un de l’autre. – They are in love with each other.
So de is simply the correct preposition with amoureux in this meaning.
Yes, amoureux is an adjective and must agree with the subject:
Masculine singular: amoureux
- Il est amoureux. – He is in love.
Feminine singular: amoureuse
- Elle est amoureuse. – She is in love.
Masculine plural (or mixed group): amoureux
- Ils sont amoureux. – They (m.) are in love.
Feminine plural: amoureuses
- Elles sont amoureuses. – They (f.) are in love.
So you would say, for example:
- Si tu es amoureuse de quelqu’un, parle-lui honnêtement. (to a woman)
Both express love, but the nuance is slightly different:
aimer quelqu’un
- literally: to love someone
- can also mean to like someone depending on context and tone
- J’aime Marie. – I love Marie.
- J’aime bien Marie. – I quite like Marie.
être amoureux de quelqu’un
- specifically: to be romantically in love with someone
- clearly emotional/romantic, not just “like”
- Je suis amoureux de Marie. – I’m in love with Marie.
In your sentence, être amoureux de quelqu’un emphasizes being romantically in love.
You can say simply:
- Si tu es amoureux, parle honnêtement. – If you are in love, speak honestly.
But then we no longer know of whom, and the lui in parle-lui becomes unclear, because lui refers to a specific person:
- de quelqu’un introduces that specific person: of someone
- lui = à cette personne (to that person)
So Si tu es amoureux de quelqu’un, parle-lui… makes the reference clear:
- you are in love with someone,
- talk to that person honestly.
Honnête is an adjective; honnêtement is an adverb.
honnête describes a noun:
- un homme honnête – an honest man
- une réponse honnête – an honest answer
honnêtement describes a verb:
- parler honnêtement – to speak honestly
- répondre honnêtement – to answer honestly
In your sentence, it’s describing how you should speak, so you need the adverb:
- parle-lui honnêtement – talk to him/her honestly
With simple verbs, the most natural positions are:
- Parle-lui honnêtement. – the usual, neutral position
- Honnêtement, parle-lui. – more emphasis, like “Honestly, talk to him.”
Something like Parle honnêtement lui would be wrong; with a pronoun, the normal order in the imperative is:
- verb + pronoun + adverb
- parle-lui honnêtement
French distinguishes between:
- tu – informal, singular (friends, family, children)
- vous – formal singular or plural (people you don’t know well, groups)
The sentence is addressing one person informally, so it uses tu and the corresponding imperative:
- Si tu es amoureux de quelqu’un, parle-lui honnêtement.
With vous, you change both the verb forms and sometimes the nuance (more formal or plural):
- Si vous êtes amoureux de quelqu’un, parlez-lui honnêtement.
- addressing one person formally, or
- several people (you all)
Structure stays the same; only the forms change: es → êtes, parle → parlez.
Quelqu’un comes from quelque un (literally “some one”).
In modern French, it’s almost always written contracted:
- quelqu’un – someone, somebody
The apostrophe is due to elision before a word starting with a vowel sound (un → ’un), which is very common in French:
- l’ami (le ami)
- j’aime (je aime)
- quelqu’un (quelque un)
So quelqu’un is just the standard, contracted spelling meaning “someone”.
In this sentence, lui is an indirect object pronoun, and lui is used for both masculine and feminine in the indirect form:
- Je lui parle. – I talk to him / I talk to her.
- Parle-lui. – Talk to him/her.
Elle is a subject pronoun (she), not used after parler à:
- Elle parle. – She is speaking.
- Je parle à elle. – sounds wrong; you must say Je lui parle.
If you were talking about her (direct object), you’d use la:
- Je la vois. – I see her.
But for parler à quelqu’un, you always use lui (singular) or leur (plural).