おし / の / にで / の/ 羨ましい

eeky · 2 Jun 2014

Hi,

1. 「その髪をなんとかおし！」

What is this おし?

2. もう片方の腕に根性悪の老いたブルドッグを抱えている。

Since [根性悪の老いた] ブルドッグ appears not to make any sense, I suppose this must be [根性悪] の [老いたブルドッグ], yes? It just seems a slightly strange use of の.

3. 爆発がとてもすさまじかったにで、屋根が吹っとんだ。

What is にで? Could it be a typo for ので?

4. 私の言ったことを絶対の忘れるな。

Is の a typo for に?

5. あなたがとても羨ましい。

I often get these kinds of adjectives the wrong way round. I read this as "You are very envious" whereas I understand it actually means "I envy you very much". Should I understand 羨ましい as meaning "enviable", or should I understand あなた as not being the subject of the adjective? I feel I may have asked a similar question before, so sorry if I have.

Toritoribe · 2 Jun 2014

1)
It's a bit classical imperative of する, i.e., しなさい (a polite prefix お + the -masu stem of する). Old people, especially women often use this form.

2)
Yes, 根性悪[こんじょうわる]の and 老いた both modify ブルドッグ. It's the same meaning as 根性の悪い, of course.

3) 4)
Right.

5)
が indicates the object (what the subject envies), but, confusingly, can also indicate the subject especially in a subordinate clause (e.g. 私が羨ましいのは彼の能力だ). It's the same as the adjectives such like 好きだ, 憎い or 面白い.

eeky · 2 Jun 2014

Thanks Toritoribe,

1. That did cross my mind actually, but since the speaker is not being at all polite I dismissed it. Has the 窶堋ｨ prefix lost its connotations of politeness in this instance?

eeky · 2 Jun 2014

Oh, and also ...

5. あなたがとても羨ましい。

How would I add the word わたし to this to produce more explicitly the meaning "I envy you very much", while keeping everything else the same? わたしにあなたがとても羨ましい maybe??

Toritoribe · 2 Jun 2014

1)
Yeah, that's not polite at all. Although this imperative is softer than ordinary imperative.

5)
わたしにはあなたがとても羨ましい is acceptable but just は is more common; わたしはあなたがとても羨ましい / 好きだ / 嫌いだ / 憎い.

eeky · 3 Jun 2014

5) Going back to the role of あなた in あなたがとても羨ましい, would you consider that あなた is the "object" of 羨ましい? Does it make sense in Japanese for adjectives to have objects? If not the object then what is it called?

Toritoribe · 3 Jun 2014

If it makes sense to you that other adjectives that express emotion or sense such like (海が好きだ, 足が痛い), -tai forms (寿司が食べたい) or potential forms(英語が話せる) have objects, 羨ましい is quite the same. These are also called 対象を表すガ格補語.

eeky · 3 Jun 2014

OK, thanks.

It's hard for me to avoid comparison with English translations, which in this area I think can be particularly unhelpful. For example, in 足が痛い, 足 seems to me to be the subject of the adjective because the corresponding English is "my foot/leg is sore/painful" or "my foot/leg hurts". In 寿司が食べたい, 寿司 seems to me to be the object of 食べたい because the English is "I want to eat sushi". あなたがとても羨ましい seems an oddity to an English-centric way of thinking because no corresponding sentence can be made with an English adjective (unless the adjective is understood to mean "enviable", which, as I understand it, is not really correct). So for me they all seem different, but for you they are the same.

Toritoribe · 3 Jun 2014

Yeah, adjectives that express "sense"(感覚形容詞) such like 痛い are a bit different from the other examples. I shouldn't have included it, sorry. を can't be used to indicate the object of 感覚形容詞. In the sentence 私は足が痛い, 足 is a part of 私, so this can be rephrased as 私の足が痛い. This is more close to 象は鼻が長い(= 象の鼻が長い).

What about your interpretation of 感情形容詞 such like 好きだ? Isn't there any problem with あなたが好きだ and 私があなたを好きだ?

eeky · 4 Jun 2014

Toritoribe said:
In the sentence 私は足が痛い, 足 is a part of 私, so this can be rephrased as 私の足が痛い. This is more close to 象は鼻が長い(= 象の鼻が長い).

Right, this all seems logical to me.

Toritoribe said:
What about your interpretation of 感情形容詞 such like 好きだ? Isn't there any problem with あなたが好きだ and 私があなたを好きだ?

For me, the "problem" with あなたが好きだ is essentially the same as the problem with あなたがとても羨ましい. First of all, it is very natural for a learner to want to make あなた the subject, as it is marked by が. Once that hurdle is overcome, and あなた is treated as an "object" of 好き, if we can call it that, there is a problem of visualisation because there is no equivalent pattern in English.

I would have guessed that 私があなたを好きだ is not correct Japanese. Do you mean to imply that it is?

Incidentally, do you know the historical reason why が, which normally denotes the subject, has ended up denoting the object in certain cases like these?

Toritoribe · 4 Jun 2014

あなた IS the object of 好きだ in あなたが好きだ. The subject "I" is omitted from the sentence, since it's obvious. You need to make clear who the subject is, e.g. 彼はあなたが好きだ, when it's ambiguous. It's quite the same also in 日本語が話せる (= 私は日本語が話せる) or 寿司が食べたい (= 私は寿司が食べたい).

As for 私があなたを好きだ, this sentence is correct in some context, for instance the subject "I" is emphasized.
e.g.
彼があなたを好きなんじゃない。私があなたを好きなんだ！

～を好きだ is a relatively new usage. If my memory is correct, 夏目漱石, one of the most famous novelists in Meiji Period, never used を as the object marker of 好きだ.

Historical thing is a bit complicated, since が was originally not a subject marker but a possession particle as same as の. Any subject marker was not used in Old Japanese.

eeky · 4 Jun 2014

Toritoribe said:
As for 私があなたを好きだ, this sentence is correct in some context

Thanks, that is interesting. It looks alien to me, but its being correct does actually help with my understanding the more usual forms.

おし / の / にで / の/ 羨ましい

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