Breakdown of Директор предложил интересный проект моему младшему племяннику.
интересный
interesting
мой
my / mine
директор
director
проект
the project
младший
younger
племянник
nephew
предложить
to offer (perfective)
Questions & Answers about Директор предложил интересный проект моему младшему племяннику.
Why is the phrase 'my younger nephew' translated as моему младшему племяннику?
It is in the Dative case because the nephew is the indirect object—the person to whom the project is offered. For masculine words in the Dative case, the noun племянник adds -у, the possessive pronoun мой becomes моему, and adjectives usually take the ending -ому or -ему.
Wait, why does the adjective младший take the ending -ему instead of the standard -ому?
This is because of a Russian spelling rule. After a 'hushing' consonant like ш, you cannot write an unstressed о. Since the stress is on the first syllable in младший, the Dative ending changes from -ому to -ему, making it младшему.
The phrase интересный проект is the direct object being offered. Why didn't its endings change?
You are right that it is the direct object, which means it is in the Accusative case. However, for masculine nouns that are inanimate (non-living things like a project), the Accusative case is identical to the Nominative (dictionary) form. Therefore, интересный проект stays exactly the same.
Why use the verb предложил instead of предлагал?
The verb предложил is the perfective past tense. It is used here because the director making the offer was a single, completed action with a concrete result. If he 'was offering' or 'regularly offered' projects, we would use the imperfective form предлагал.
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