Breakdown of Этот тёмный дом никому не нравится.
дом
house
не
not
этот
this [f: эта, n: это]
нравиться
to please / to appeal
никто
nobody
тёмный
dark (adjective)
Questions & Answers about Этот тёмный дом никому не нравится.
Why do we use никому here instead of никто?
The verb нравиться (to like) requires the person who likes something to be in the Dative case. Since никто means 'nobody' in the Nominative case, we have to change it to its Dative form, никому.
Why is there a не before нравится if никому already means 'nobody'?
Russian uses double negatives. Whenever you use a negative pronoun like никому (to nobody), you must also make the verb negative by adding не. Literally, the structure translates to 'to nobody it does not please'.
If 'nobody' is in the Dative case, what is the grammatical subject of this sentence?
The subject is Этот тёмный дом (this dark house). Because we are using нравиться, the thing being liked is the grammatical subject and takes the Nominative case. The verb нравится is in the third-person singular form to match 'house'.
Is it okay to change the word order and start with никому?
Yes! Russian word order is very flexible. You can absolutely say Никому не нравится этот тёмный дом. The word order in this example simply places slightly more emphasis on 'this dark house' by introducing it first.
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