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話し手 / もてる / 家庭教師 / 一度 / はね / この間も

eeky

先輩
8 Jun 2010
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Hello,


1. This is a note on making requests:

話し手との人間関係に距離があるほど、また内容が頼み にくい場合、前置きと理由が長くなることが多いです。

My translation: "It is common for the preliminaries and the reason (for asking) to become longer the more distant the relationship with 話し手 and the more awkward the request."

Does 話し手 refer to the person making the request or the person receiving the request? The sentence only really makes sense to me as the latter, but wouldn't that be 相手?


2. 彼はもてる物すべてを失った。

Translation given: "He lost his all."

Is もてる = 持てる? Why is it potential form? Or could it be a typo for もっている?


3. These are two explanatory/introductory sentences about the same dialogue:

家庭教師を頼まれたが断るという設定の会話を聞いて.. .
足立さんが、先生に子供の家庭教師を頼まれます。

My translation:
"Listen to the dialogue, (which portrays) a scene in which (someone) is asked to be a home tutor but declines..."
"Mr Adachi is asked by 先生 to be a home tutor to 先生's child."

a) Is this correct? Have I got the right people doing the right things?

b) As far as I can tell, the person referred to as 先生 (片岡 in the extract below, as far as I can tell) is a corporate employee, not a teacher, doctor, professor, etc.. Is 先生 possible in that case as a general respectful term? 先生 and 家庭教師 are different people, right? I'm wondering if I may have got mixed up about who is who.


4.
片岡 has asked 足立 to tutor his son. 足立 is too busy and has suggested instead that a friend of his could do it.

片岡: じゃあ、私、太郎に一度聞いてからお返事して もいいですか。
足立: ええ。
片岡: 太郎はね「絶対に足立さん足立さん」って、こ の間もすごく言っていたもんですから。

My translation:

片岡: Well, is it OK if I just go and ask 太郎 [his son] and then let you know?
足立: OK.
片岡: 太郎 still keeps on insisting "I only want 足立さん, 足立さん".

a) I have roughly tried to capture the meaning of 一度 as "just". Is that reasonable?

b) I assume はね = は (topic) + ね (emphasis), right? Having previously been used to ね only at the end of sentences, in these dialogues I seem to be seeing it used a lot mid-sentence.

c) I am not completely certain about この間もすごく言っていたもんですから. Is "still keeps on insisting" reasonable? (Literally "kept on insisting", but present tense seems more natural in English.)
ent tense seems more natural in English.)
 
1)
The former. Both 話し手との人間関係 and 相手との人間関係 are the same as 話し手と相手との人間関係.

2)
That's not the potential of 持つ but a word from a classical Japanese.

持てる
[連語]《動詞「も(持)つ」の已然形+完了の助動詞 「り」の連体形》持っているだけの。また、十分過ぎる くらい持っている。「―力を出しきる」「―者の悩み」
持てる - goo辞書

3) a)
Yes.

b)
Yes about "先生 and 家庭教師 are different people", but no for the title 先生. 先生 is not used for that purpose.

4) a)
Yes.

b)
[間助]文節の切れ目に付いて、相手の注意をひくよう に語勢を添えたり、語調を整えたりする意を表す。「し かし―、こっちだって―、都合があるんだよ」
ね - goo辞書

Thus, ね is used at the end of a phrase/clause, too.

c)
Yes.
 
Thank you.

When you describe words as "from classical Japanese", does that always mean that they are now old-fashioned (or very literary)?
 
Not always so. It's just originally/grammatically not from modern Japansese. Some of them are quite commonly used also in daily conversation; just like ~ざるをえない, あらん限り.
 
I'm trying to get clear in my mind what it is about a word that enables you to identify it as "from classical Japanese", even when it is also in common modern use. I mean, I assume there must be numerous words (let's take 川 as a likely random example) that are the same in both classical Japanese and modern Japanese, yet which you would not especially identify as "from classical Japanese" if you came across them, right? Is it correct that words in the category "from classical Japanese yet used in modern daily conversation" are old grammatical forms (esp. verb/adjective endings) frozen in certain set expressions or contexts?

I hope that question makes sense ... I had a hard time formulating it!
 
Yeah, you seem to understand the issue correctly. The grammatical structure "已然形 of a verb + an auxiliary verb り which expresses the perfect tense" is quite common in classical Japanese, but this り/る is no longer used in modern Japanese. 持てる is a remnant. So, you can think this word a kind of idiom.
 
The same goes for the ~ざるをえない example that Toritobe cited. In Classical Japanese, ~ざる was a common way of expressing negative verbs, but in MJ, it's rarely seen outside of the set phrase ざるをえない.
 
Thank you both. I remember ~ざる also from the "three wise monkeys", 見ざる, 聞かざる, 言わざる, which I find very amusing!
 
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