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HSK 6 Connectors & compound sentences

乃 / 乃是 / 乃至(于)

Namely / even up to (乃 / 乃至)

Structure A + 乃(是) + B (emphatic copula) / … + 乃至(于) + extreme case

乃 (nǎi) is a Classical Chinese word still alive in cultured language, with two uses. (1) As an emphatic COPULA, it means "is precisely / is none other than": 失败乃成功之母 = "failure is precisely the mother of success"; 乃是 reinforces that "is" with gravity. (2) 乃至 and its variant 乃至于 mean "and even, up to", marking an ESCALATION: after listing something, a larger or extreme case is added, 全国乃至全世界 = "the whole country and even the entire world". It belongs to literary and essayistic register; in speech one would say 是 or 甚至.

Examples

  • shībàinǎichénggōngzhī

    Failure is precisely the mother of success.

  • chéngxìnnǎishìzhīběn

    Integrity is none other than the foundation of any enterprise.

  • zhèxiàngshùyǐngxiǎngquánguónǎizhìquánshìjiè

    This technology affects the whole country and even the entire world.

  • guānrénnǎizhìzhěnghángdewèilái

    This move concerns the individual and even the future of the whole industry.

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