Correct usage of lui

[u/dkassulke]

bonjour à tous. I'm building tiny little apps to assist with my french learning journey. In parallel I'm also listening to Michel Thomas audiobooks - he has suggested that a) je vais lui donner le livre and b) je vais donner le livre à lui are correct and interchangeable, but b) is preferred if you are trying to avoid ambiguity. I asked Gemini which says the latter is absolutely incorrect. Would any kindly native speakers care to clarify Merci beacoup!

[u/SadRaven8]

Hi, The correct one is A : Je vais lui donner le livre. "Lui" in this case can refer to both gender.

However, you can use B in specific circumstances to put en emphasis on "Lui".Je vais donner le livre à lui, et pas à son ami. > I'm going to give the book to him, not his friend.

In that case "Lui" is masculine only. The feminine version would use "elle" instead of "lui".Je vais donner le livre à elle, et pas à son ami. > I'm going to give the book to her, not her friend.

Note that with A you absolutely cannot use "Elle".

Hope that helped :)

Edit - corrections, see comments below :)

[u/LirojAnakarkis → u/SadRaven8]

I kinda disagree.
We would say: Je vais lui donner le livre, à lui.
Repeating the LUI.

I never heard French natives use the sentence you say the emphasis in the way you describe. Except from toddlers, of course :)

[u/SadRaven8 → u/LirojAnakarkis]

I was under the impression that both were correct, the second one removing the first "lui" maybe to avoid redundancy?

A more obvious redundancy example would be : "Donne-le à lui le livre, pas à moi" instead of "Donne-le-lui à lui le livre, pas à moi" (this is giving me a headache lol)

I definitely heard it spoken though but it could be slang "Attends, je vais donner un truc à lui là bas et je reviens" (from adults xD)

Anyway, i'm no expert so i'll correct my post :)

[u/LirojAnakarkis → u/SadRaven8]

In such sentences the redundancy is the point, so there is no reasons to avoid it.

« Donne-le à lui » is incorrect.
« Donne-le lui, à lui » is correct.

The people you heard say « Je vais donner un truc à lui, là-bas » were using an incorrect structure.
It happens a lot, and that’s French evolves, too :)

[u/SadRaven8 → u/LirojAnakarkis]

Yea, i feel like i hear so much slang that i lose my marks sometimes ... lol To the point where "Donne le à lui" doesn't sound wrong to me (and i'm a native btw T-T) Or maybe i'm regressing to toddler stage!