Breakdown of Бесполезно дрессировать щенка, пока он не перестанет грызть наши вещи.
он
he / it (for a masculine noun) / it (for a neuter noun)
наш
our (наш, наша, наше)
вещь
thing
щенок
puppy
пока не
until
перестать
to stop, to cease (perfective)
дрессировать
to train (animals)
бесполезно
useless
грызть
to chew
Questions & Answers about Бесполезно дрессировать щенка, пока он не перестанет грызть наши вещи.
How can we rewrite this using the как ни structure from this lesson to mean "No matter how much you train the puppy, he won't stop..."?
You can pair как ни with a verb to express that an action yields no result despite its high degree. A natural way to phrase this is: Как ни дрессируй щенка, он не перестанет грызть наши вещи. Notice how как ни is frequently followed by the imperative form (дрессируй) to mean "no matter how much one does this."
Why is there a не in пока он не перестанет? It looks literally like "until he doesn't stop."
When "until" refers to waiting for a specific result to be achieved, Russian requires the structure пока не followed by a perfective verb (in this case, перестанет). It helps to think of it logically as "while he has not yet stopped."
Why is грызть (to chew) in the imperfective aspect here?
Перестанет is a "phase verb"—a verb that indicates the start, continuation, or end of an action (like to begin, to continue, to stop). In Russian, phase verbs must always be followed by an imperfective infinitive, which is why we must use грызть.
Could we use a perfective verb instead of дрессировать if we are talking about training the puppy to a point of completion?
No, you should stick to the imperfective. Adverbs that express that an action is useless, unnecessary, or forbidden—such as бесполезно (useless), не надо (no need), and не стоит (not worth it)—almost always take an imperfective infinitive.
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