L'ordre des pronoms II : y et en ferment la chaîne

Unité GR-19 · campagne 8 · il y en a : la chaîne complète, jusqu'au bout.

Me, te, se, nous, vous as direct or indirect pronouns, and pronominal verbs with other pronouns (je m'en souviens, je me présente à lui), are on Me, te, se, nous, vous : un pronom, deux fonctions — et les verbes pronominaux.

Where the whole chain goes in every tense and structure — présent, passé composé, modal + infinitive, imperative — is on Où va le pronom ? Une seule règle, cinq cadres.

Unit GR-18 gave you the first three columns. This unit adds the last two — y, then en — and closes the clitic table for good:

Two consequences, and they settle every combination you will meet:

1. En is always last. Whatever else stands in the chain, en closes it:

• Tu as parlé de ce problème à ton chef ? — Oui, je lui en ai parlé.
• Du pain ? Je vous en apporte.
• Des nouvelles ? Il m'en donne rarement.

2. Y comes just before en — which produces the most frequent two-clitic phrase in the language: il y en a. Des cafés dans ce quartier ? Il y en a beaucoup. Il n'y en a plus. Say it as one word, [iljɑ̃na], because that is how you will hear it.

Y also combines with a direct object from column 2, giving the compact l'y type: Tu accompagnes ta mère à la gare ? — Oui, je l'y accompagne. Rare in speech, but regular: column 2 before column 4, as the table predicts.

For a Russian speaker the deep difficulty is that y and en have no equivalent at all — nothing in там / оттуда / их behaves like a mandatory pre-verbal slot. Treat the five-column table as a template you fill from left to right, and let il y en a be your anchor: if your chain contradicts it, the chain is wrong. The practice covers lui en, bare en, y en, and l'y — the four shapes that exhaust this unit.

Going further

Il y en a in every shape. It is the phrase you will use most, so learn its variants as whole units:

With the quantity words. En closes the chain, and the quantity comes after the verb: Des cousins ? Il m'en reste quelques-uns. Je lui en ai offert plusieurs.

In the imperative, en and y still close the chain — and -s comes back on -er verbs before them, for the sound: Donnes-en à ton frère, Vas-y, Parles-en à ta mère. Where the whole chain sits in each tense and structure is on Où va le pronom ?.

The errors to watch.

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Oui / non drill

A question, then two answers to write: the oui answer and the non answer, each with the complement replaced by its pronoun. Every answer is graded, and a wrong one names the rule it breaks.

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