Breakdown of Dói-me o corpo todo.
Questions & Answers about Dói-me o corpo todo.
Why is it Dói-me o corpo instead of O meu corpo dói?
In Portuguese, when talking about body parts, you usually do not use possessive words like meu. Instead, you use the definite article (o or a) for the body part and an indirect object pronoun (like me) to show who it belongs to. So, Dói-me o corpo basically translates as the body hurts to me. What is the subject of this sentence?
The subject is actually o corpo (the body), even though it is at the very end of the sentence. The verb dói is in the singular form because it agrees with o corpo. If your feet were hurting, the subject would be plural, and you would instead say Doem-me os pés. Why is there a hyphen in Dói-me?
The pronoun me is attached to the end of the verb with a hyphen because affirmative Portuguese sentences generally do not start with an object pronoun. If you added a negative word at the beginning, the pronoun would be pulled to the front, as in Não me dói o corpo. Does todo always go after the noun like in o corpo todo?
Placing todo after the noun is very common in spoken Portuguese to mean the entire thing. You can also put it before the noun, as in todo o corpo, which means exactly the same thing, but o corpo todo often sounds a bit more natural in everyday conversation. Learn Dói-me o corpo todo and more in Portuguese
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