FR: Offrez un livre à ta copine - le / en / un

[La studentessa]

Bonjour
I'm having difficulty with a sentence: I want to replace the underlined words with pronouns in the following sentence: Offrez un livre a ta copine pour son anniversaire. (Sorry, can't do the accents).
My attempt: Offrez-le-lui. However, it doesn't seem right to me. Would it be better to say Offrez-lui-en/offrez-lui-un, or something completely different?
Merci d'avance

 

[guillaumedemanzac]

Context? It's not possible to say Offer it to her for her birthday unless you say what it is - it could be un cadeau, un chien, un livre, un diamant.
So you need to give the sentence before your example.
Offrez-lui en and offrez-lui un diamant (the noun is needed)

 

[misterk]

This sounds like a standard question in French grammar from a French language course. (The "it" is in fact perfectly clear in the sentence provided; it is un livre.)

Studentessa: Your first attempt was correct, even if it doesn't sounds natural to your ears quite yet. (Offrez-lui-en would mean "Offer him/her some of them.")

 

[La studentessa]

Thank you for the answers. Misterk you are right - it is a basic grammar question. I have looked everywhere in my books (I have a few) but couldn't find the answer. Also searched Internet.
Merci beaucoup!

 

[atcheque]

Bonjour,

In French, the undefined article, and the numerical adjective are transformed in the association of pronoums "en + nombre", meaning "number of it" :
Offrez un livre à ta copine pour son anniversaire : Offrez-lui-en un pour son anniversaire.

 

[Maître Capello]

Offrez un livre à ta copine → Offrez-lui-en un. (indefinite article un or numeral deux, trois, etc. → pronoun en + number)

Anyway, note that your first suggestion is also correct, but it doesn't mean the same thing:

Offrez le/ce livre à ta copine → Offrez-le-lui. (definite article le or demonstrative adjective ce → pronoun le)

 

[moustic]

Isn't it odd that the verb is "offrez", second person plural, and the possessive is "ta", second person singular?

 

[Maître Capello]

Yes, it is indeed a bit odd but it is still possible if you are telling the boyfriend and, say, his brother to make a joint gift.

 

[moustic]

Ah! I hadn't thought of that!

 

[guillaumedemanzac]

As misterk pointed out it is a grammar test and therefore doesn't have to make sense. In context it would have to be something like: This is a good book. Why don't you and you brother offer it (= the book not a book) to your copine (not your brother's copine). As we have pointed out the "offrez" and "ta" do not fit and the un livre and the le do not work in Lastudentessa's example which does not mention the specific book or the hypothetical brother.
I am joking but the ridiculous example given has to be taken seriously as an example of trying to impose grammar on people without any context.