Questions

Questions Answerable by Yes or No

48.A question expecting yes or no is formed by putting ar at the head of the statement. Nothing else changes: the word order stays as it was, and no auxiliary is introduced as English introduces do. In speech ar is often dropped and the question carried by intonation alone, but in writing it should be kept.

Tu kalbi lietuviškai. → Ar tu kalbi lietuviškai?

You speak Lithuanian. → Do you speak Lithuanian?

Ar tai tavo knyga?

Is this your book?

Taip, kalbu. / Ne, nekalbu.

Yes, I do. / No, I don't. — the verb is repeated where English says 'do'

• [1] Lithuanian has no word for the English "do" of questions and negatives. Ar tu dirbi? is literally "whether you work?".

Kas and its Cases

49.Kas asks who? and what? alike — Lithuanian does not distinguish them in the nominative — and it declines like any pronoun. Which form is used depends on the job the missing word does in the answer, so that choosing the question word correctly means having decided in advance what case the answer will be in.

Kas tai?

What is this? / Who is this?

Ką jūs valgote?

What are you eating?

Ko tu nori?

What do you want? — genitive, because norėti governs it (¶39)

The Question Adverbs

50.Beside kas stand the invariable question words: kur (where), kada (when), kaip (how), kodėl (why), kiek (how much, how many). They open the sentence and are followed by the verb or by the subject indifferently. Kodėl is answered with nes, because.

Kur tu gyveni?

Where do you live?

Kaip Jūsų vardas?

What is your name? — Lithuanian asks 'how', not 'what'

Kodėl ji nedirba? — Nes ji studijuoja.

Why is she not working? — Because she is studying.

Kiek kavos tu nori?

How much coffee do you want? — kiek governs the genitive (¶32)

• [1] Kaip Jūsų vardas? is the ordinary way to ask a name. Asking Kas Jūsų vardas? is a translation from English and marks a foreigner at once.

Koks — What Kind of

51.Koks asks after a quality, as English what kind of or what … like. Unlike the question adverbs it is an adjective and agrees in gender with the noun it asks about: masculine koks, feminine kokia. It is answered with an adjective, which agrees in its turn.

Koks yra Vilnius?

What is Vilnius like?

Kokia tavo sesuo?

What is your sister like?

Answering in the Case Asked

52.A short answer stands in the case of the question word, and in no other. Ką? is answered with an accusative, ko? with a genitive, kas? with a nominative. The question thus carries the grammar of its own answer, and a learner who has chosen the question word rightly cannot go wrong in answering it.

Kas dirba? — Mokytojas.

Who is working? — The teacher. — nominative

Ką tu matai? — Mokytoją.

Whom do you see? — The teacher. — accusative

Ko tu nematai? — Mokytojo.

Whom do you not see? — The teacher. — genitive after negation