Breakdown of I ricambi sono cari, ma li continuo a cercare online.
essere
to be
ma
but
caro
expensive, dear
cercare
to look for
Questions & Answers about I ricambi sono cari, ma li continuo a cercare online.
Why is li placed before continuo instead of being attached to cercare?
This is an example of clitic climbing. With aspectual verbs like continuare a (to continue to), you have two options for pronoun placement. You can either put the pronoun before the conjugated verb (li continuo a cercare) or attach it to the end of the infinitive (continuo a cercarli). Both are completely correct and natural.
If I wanted to attach li to the end of the infinitive, how exactly would I spell it?
Why do we use the preposition a here? Does the pronoun placement affect it?
The verb continuare requires the preposition a whenever it is followed by an infinitive to mean 'to continue doing something'. Moving the pronoun li to the front of the conjugated verb doesn't change this rule; the a must remain in place to link the conjugated verb to the infinitive.
What exactly does li refer to here, and why use a direct object pronoun when the English translation says 'look FOR'?