What's the difference between those two (hopefully correct) sentences?
Вам нужен человек, у кого быстрая машина.
Вам нужен человек, у которого быстрая машина.
1 Answer
“…, который” introduces attributive clauses. Since your sentence has an attributive clause, only the second variant is correct, and the first one is grammatically wrong.
-
When to use the first case or when to use кто then?– user3538Jul 9, 2014 at 18:41
-
@embert - Well, that's a different question. The first case is wrong, I've already said that. “…, кто” introduces objective clauses (Я знаю, кто это сделал. - I know who did it), “кто …” introduces subjective clauses (Кто не работает, тот не ест. - Those who don't work, don't eat). Jul 9, 2014 at 19:02
-
Are there cases both can be used?– user3538Jul 9, 2014 at 19:16
-
In the two examples in the comment above, only "кто" can be used. Basically, you can use кто in "(тот), кто ..." ("the one who ..."), but when you explicitly say a noun, use "который": "Где женщина, о которой нам рассказали?"/ "Вот и пёс, который жил у моего друга"/ "Это человек, у которого каждый день новая машина". Jul 9, 2014 at 19:42
-
I cannot quickly cover ALL cases right now (must think carefully), but a rule of thumb is, where you cannot use "which" and still make sense in English, you cannot use "который" in Russian. Can you say something like "I know which did it" or "Which does not work does not eat"? If it sounds really wrong, then we are probably on the right track. The basis for the whole thing is that "кто" explicitly refers to a living being while "который" just makes a dummy object/subject in a subordinate clause. Still, while in English "the man who X" sounds OK, in Russian you can only use "который" like this. Jul 9, 2014 at 19:46