Learn Hardcore Russian: Читай книгу, пока тебе интересно.

читай is the 2nd person singular imperative of читать (to read). It’s in the imperfective aspect, which emphasizes an ongoing or repeated action rather than a single completed event.

Why is the verb in the imperfective aspect here, not perfective?

The imperfective aspect is used because the instruction is about reading as long as it continues to be interesting. A perfective form (e.g. прочитай) would imply completing the whole reading once, regardless of interest.

Why is книгу in the accusative case?

книгу is the direct object of читай. In Russian, the thing you read must be in the accusative case.

What does пока mean in this sentence?

Here пока means “while” or “as long as.” It introduces a subordinate clause indicating the time during which you should keep reading.

Why is тебе in the dative case in пока тебе интересно?

The adjective/adverb интересно forms an impersonal construction: “it is interesting to you.” In such constructions, the experiencer (you) goes into the dative case, hence тебе.

Why is there no explicit subject in the clause пока тебе интересно?

This is an impersonal clause. The “it” in “it’s interesting” is not expressed (Russian treats интересно as a predicative adverb). The experiencer is given by the dative тебе, and no nominative subject appears.

Why is there a comma between the two parts?

A comma separates the main clause (Читай книгу) from the subordinate temporal clause (пока тебе интересно). In Russian, you place a comma before conjunctions like пока when they introduce a subordinate clause.

How would you modify the sentence to address multiple people instead of one?

Use the plural or formal imperative читайте instead of читай: • Читайте книгу, пока вам интересно.

Why is интересно used instead of интересная here?

интересно is an impersonal predicative adverb meaning “it is interesting.” интересная is an adjective (“interesting” as a property of something) and would require a noun subject in nominative case (e.g. книга интересная).

Could you drop тебе and simply say Читай книгу, пока интересно?

Yes, colloquially you can say Читай книгу, пока интересно, and it will still be understood as “read the book while it’s interesting.” Omitting тебе makes it more general (“while it’s interesting” to anyone), though some learners prefer keeping тебе for clarity.