Он гений.

In Russian, the verb to be is usually omitted in the present tense.

So:

• Он гений = He is a genius
• literally: He genius

This is completely normal Russian. In the past or future, forms of to be do appear:

• Он был гением = He was a genius
• Он будет гением = He will be a genius

So the missing is is not a mistake; it is standard Russian grammar.

Он is the Russian third-person singular pronoun for he.

It is used for:

• a male person: Он врач = He is a doctor
• a masculine noun: Стол? Он большой. = The table? It is big.

Russian nouns have grammatical gender, so он can also refer to things that are grammatically masculine, not just men.

Its basic forms are:

• он = he
• она = she
• оно = it
• они = they

Russian has no articles, so there is no separate word for a or the.

That means гений can mean:

• a genius
• the genius
• sometimes just genius, depending on context

The exact meaning comes from the situation, context, and intonation.

So:

• Он гений can mean He is a genius
• in another context, гений could also be understood more broadly as He is genius itself or He’s the genius, though He is a genius is the most natural translation here.

Here гений is in the nominative case, which is the dictionary form.

In Russian, after a present-tense implied to be, the predicate noun is often in the nominative:

• Он гений = He is a genius
• Она актриса = She is an actress

However, Russian also sometimes uses the instrumental case, especially in other tenses:

• Он был гением = He was a genius

So in this short present-tense sentence, гений in the nominative is natural and common.

Гений is pronounced approximately GYE-nee-y.

A rough guide:

• ге sounds like gye
• ни sounds like nee
• й adds a short y sound at the end

The stress is on the first syllable:

• ге́ний

So the pronunciation is roughly:

• GYE-niy

Not exact English, of course, but that is a helpful approximation.

In гений, the -ий is just part of the noun’s normal form. It is not a separate word meaning anything by itself here.

Many masculine Russian nouns end in:

• a consonant: дом
• -й: герой
• -ь: учитель

Гений belongs to the type of masculine nouns that end in -й in the nominative singular.

So you should learn гений as a whole vocabulary item, not split it into meaningful pieces for this sentence.

Yes, Russian word order is flexible, but the meaning or emphasis changes.

• Он гений = the neutral, standard way to say He is a genius
• Гений он = more marked, with emphasis like He’s a genius, He really is a genius, or A genius, that’s what he is

Russian often uses word order to show focus or emphasis rather than basic grammatical roles alone.

For a learner, Он гений is the safest and most neutral version.

No. Гений is a masculine noun grammatically, but it can describe any person, depending on context.

You can say:

• Он гений = He is a genius
• Она гений = She is a genius

Even though the noun itself is grammatically masculine, it is often used for women too.

Russian sometimes does this with profession words, titles, or descriptive nouns. The grammatical gender of the noun does not always limit the real-life gender of the person.

Because in modern Russian, есть is normally not used as a present-tense is in simple sentences like this.

So:

• natural: Он гений
• unnatural or very marked in most everyday contexts: Он есть гений

The word есть does exist in Russian, but it is usually used in other ways, for example:

1. to mean there is / there are in some contexts
2. for emphasis or contrast
3. as the verb to eat in a completely different verb pair

For a basic sentence like He is a genius, just say Он гений.

Yes. In writing, Russian sometimes uses a dash between the subject and predicate noun:

• Он — гений.

The dash can add emphasis, clarity, or a more formal written style. In very short simple sentences, you may also see it omitted:

• Он гений.

Both are possible in writing, but Он гений is perfectly fine and very common, especially in beginner materials.

You add не before the noun:

• Он не гений. = He is not a genius.

This is the normal pattern:

• Он врач. = He is a doctor.
• Он не врач. = He is not a doctor.

So for this kind of sentence, negation is very straightforward: не + the predicate word.