As you learn to speak Russian, you will find it helpful to be able to describe someone's personality. This lesson introduces the key Russian words and expressions to help you talk about yourself or other people.
Why Is It Important to Learn to Describe Someone's Personality in Russian?
Imagine you need to reference people in a Russian conversation with your colleague, set someone up on a blind date or discuss fictional characters in your favourite book or the latest trending Netflix series. It would be rather hard to do without the appropriate Russian words in those situations.
Importantly, there will be times when you need to describe yourself in Russian. For example, you may be in a job interview and the interviewer asks you: "What are your strengths and weaknesses?" Do you know how to say things like: "I'm hard-working and creative", "I'm impatient" or "I'm chatty"?
For all of these reasons, it’s important to learn the key Russian words to talk about people's personalities.
How to Describe Someone's Personality in Russian
When you are having a Russian conversation about someone, the person you are speaking to may ask you:
Что он за человек? - What kind of person is he?
Что она за человек? - What kind of person is she?
Что они за люди? - What kind of people are they?
To answer the question, begin the sentence with Он / Она / Они (He / She is / They are...) and follow up with one of the appropriate adjectives (descriptive words) below.
In Russian, adjective endings change depending on whether the person you are talking about is male or female. In addition, Russian adjectives agree in case with the noun they describe. The adjective endings are also different for singular and plural forms. In this Russian lesson, we only look at a simple construction He / She is / They are ... so we're only interested in tackling the Nominative Case (dictionary form) adjective endings.
Add ‘ая’ or ‘яя’ to the adjective to describe a female person:
Она красивая - She is good-looking
Add ‘ый’ or ‘ий’ or sometimes ‘ой’ to the adjective to describe a male person:
Он красивый - He is good-looking
Add ‘ые’ or ‘ие’ to the adjective to describe more than one person:
Они красивые - They are good-looking
The following vocabulary list includes the best Russian adjectives and expressions you can use to describe people’s personalities. These Russian words are given in the masculine singular form:
Яркая личность - someone who is bright, active, positive, skilful and with a lot of charisma.
Доброе сердце - a kind heart.
In Russian, to say I have or you have we use this construction: у меня or у тебя есть + adjective + noun.
There's more to this rule (as usual with Russian): if you want to emphasise the adjective more than the noun and if/where it exists, есть is not used.
In our example, let's say we want to emphasise to our friend that they have a KIND heart (quality), not that their heart exists in their body (it's rather obvious, everyone has a heart). So у тебя доброе сердце.
For example, someone asks if you have a family: у вас есть семья? Your answer could be: да, у меня есть семья. You're both interested in the fact that the family exists or doesn't. Or you could answer: да, у меня большая семья (yes, I do, I have a BIG family) emphasising the quality more than the fact it exists.
There are other points to the usage of есть but the above rule is the most useful one I wanted to mention in this lesson.
Верный друг - a good loyal friend.
Смелый - daring.
Злой - angry.
Креативный - creative.
Трудолюбивый - hard-working.
Hungry for more useful Russian words? Here is more!
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Quiz
Take this short quiz to find out how well you know the words to describe people in Russian.
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