Lesson 9 is here! In this lesson, we’ll learn a handful of useful prepositions, then something we learned in a previous lesson, but with some more depth added to it.
| I. Prepositions with Genitive |
The expressions we’ll be learning below all require the genitive case.
The prepositions далеко [far] and близко [close] are often followed by от. We can now express something a little more complex:
| Далеко от вулкана есть деревня. There’s a village far from the volcano. |
| Близко от вулкана есть море. There’s a sea close to the volcano. |
Here we use есть to express existence.
And we can negate these sentences. We replace есть with нет, and remember, with нет the genitive is required.
| Далеко от вулкана нет деревни. There isn’t a village far from the volcano. |
| Близко от вулкана нет моря. There isn’t a sea near the volcano. |
Let’s throw in two more prepositions followed by от:
| Слева от магазина есть аптека. There’s a pharmacy to the left of the store. |
| Справа от аптеки есть магазина. There’s a store to the right of the pharmacy. |
Also, note that the word order is different in Russian here. In Russian, new information tends to come at the end of a sentence. And old information comes at the beginning. This helps us decide which article to use in the translation.
Having learned this, we can form sentences with greater depth.
| –Что это? –Это вулкан. Он очень большой, и далеко от него есть деревня. -What is this? -It’s a volcano. It’s very big, and there’s a village far from it. |
The preposition от means from when used with people.
| Это письмо от дедушки. It’s a letter from grandpa. |
| Это сообщение от Адриана. It’s a message from Adrian. |
The useful construction от…до… means from…to… when referring to location.
| От Берлина до Томска очень далеко. From Berlin to Tomsk, it’s very far. |
…In case you were wondering, Tomsk is a city in Siberia.
The preposition до means [up] until. Having learned its meaning, you can fully understand these phrases we learned in lesson 5.5.
| До втречи! See you later! [lit. until the meeting] |
| До завтра! See you tomorrow! [lit. until tomorrow] |
There’s also a useful expression to learn: до чего [же]. It roughly translates as what a [indicating surprise, admiration]. By the way, чего is the genitive of что. We’ll learn more about this declension later!
| До чего же прекрасный день! What a beautiful day! |
The preposition без means without.
| Вот кофе без сахара. Here’s a coffee without sugar. |
| Вот женщина без макияжа. Here’s a woman without make-up. |
| II. Expressing What is? Who is? |
In a previous lesson, we learned how to express what is this? and who is this? They are: Что это? Кто это?
What if you wanted to ask, for example, what is a house? In this sense, you are asking for the definition of a house. You would then need to say:
| Что такое дом? What is a house? |
The word такое will remain unchanged regardless of the noun’s gender or number.
| Что такое книга? What is a book? |
| Что такое море? What is a sea? |
| Что такое часы? What is a watch? |
This can also be used with people. However, with people you need to have agreement with такой. This adjective works like this:
| m. | f. | n. | pl. |
|---|---|---|---|
| такой | такая | такое | такие |
…this adjective also has some interesting meanings that we’ll discuss late on.
| Кто такой Владимир Путин? Who is Vladimir Putin? |
| Кто такая Арина Сабаленко? Who is Arina Sabalenka? |
| Кто такие Ивановы? Who are the Ivanovs? |
In these instances, you could say кто + person of interest, but the above constructions add a little more emphasis. What is this person like? Their profession, goals, etc.
That is all for today’s lesson! See you in the next lesson, which will be a review lesson!
| Last Edit: 02/16/2026. |
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