A (not so) quick question about the placement of "but".

Nicky · 29 Jan 2006

Ok I want to say "I like spring and autumn but the trees are prettier in autumn/autumn has prettier trees". In english I know how to shove it all into one big ol' sentence and call it a day. But since I'm not very good at japanese , I have to break it down into smaller sentences.

So far I've come up with:

私は春と秋が好きです。
And,
秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。

when I stick them together I get:
私は春と秋が好きです。秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。
"I like spring and autumn. The trees in autumn are prettier."

So where exactly do I place the "but"?

Would it be at the end of the first sentence:
私は春と秋が好きですけど。

Or at the beginning of the second?
けど秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。

And more importantly, does it matter where I place it? Should I even bother with adding "but"? And does my japanese sentence make sense? Would it change the meaning if I used 「だけど」 oｒ「けれども」？
:?

I also want to add "I think".
私は春と秋が好きです。秋に、木々は、よりきれいですと思います。
It is ok to add 「と思う」 onto 「です」? I've never seen it used with desu. I only ever see it used with verbs. Then again I don't get to see natural written japanese that much...

助けてください！

KrazyKat · 29 Jan 2006

Nicky said:
Ok I want to say "I like spring and autumn but the trees are prettier in autumn/autumn has prettier trees". In english I know how to shove it all into one big ol' sentence and call it a day. But since I'm not very good at japanese , I have to break it down into smaller sentences.
So far I've come up with:
私は春と秋が好きです。
And,
秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。
when I stick them together I get:
私は春と秋が好きです。秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。
"I like spring and autumn. The trees in autumn are prettier."
So where exactly do I place the "but"?
Would it be at the end of the first sentence:
私は春と秋が好きですけど。
Or at the beginning of the second?
けど秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。
And more importantly, does it matter where I place it? Should I even bother with adding "but"? And does my japanese sentence make sense? Would it change the meaning if I used 「だけど」 oｒ「けれども」？
:?
I also want to add "I think".
私は春と秋が好きです。秋に、木々は、よりきれいですと思います。
It is ok to add 「と思う」 onto 「です」? I've never seen it used with desu. I only ever see it used with verbs. Then again I don't get to see natural written japanese that much...
助けてください！

Hi!
Kedo comes at the end of the first bit. demo, however, would come at the beginning of a sentence.
keredomo etc. are just more formal versions of kedo.

However, there is an important mistake in your sentence. You have to say haru yori, not just yori.

you wouldn't but toomoimasu after desu because the polite verb comes at the end. It would follow da after a noun and come straight after a true adjective.

Hope I helped!

The7thSamurai · 29 Jan 2006

This is what I would say, but I could be wrong.

This one uses "ga" as "but":
秋も春も好きだが秋の葉の方がきれいだと思います。
aki mo haru mo suki da ga aki no ha no hou ga kirei da to omoimasu.
"I like both autum and spring but autumn's leaves are more beautiful, I think"

or

This one uses "keredomo" as "although":
秋も春も好きだけれども秋の葉の方がきれいだと思います。
aki mo haru mo suki da keredomo aki no ha no hou ga kireu da to omoimasu.
"Although I like both autumn and spring, autumn's leaves are more beautiful, I think"

KrazyKat · 29 Jan 2006

Bucko said:
This is what I would say, but I could be wrong.
This one uses "ga" as "but":
秋も春も好きだが秋の葉の方がきれいだと思います。
aki mo haru mo suki da ga aki no ha no hou ga kirei da to omoimasu.
"I like both autumn and spring but autumn's leaves are more beautiful, I think"
or
This one uses "keredomo" as "although":
秋も春も好きだけれども秋の葉の方がきれいだと思います。
aki mo haru mo suki da keredomo aki no ha no hou ga kireu da to omoimasu.
"Although I like both autumn and spring, autumn's leaves are more beautiful, I think"

Wouldn't desu ga and desu keredomo be more appropriate?

epigene · 29 Jan 2006

The following are my suggestions. I'll leave grammatical analysis to others with better understanding in that area.

Nicky said:
私は春と秋が好きです。
And,
秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。

The second one should be: 秋は、木々が、よりきれいです。

私は春と秋が好きですけど。
Or at the beginning of the second?
けど秋に、木々は、よりきれいです。

If "kedo" is at the end of the first sentence, it has a different meaning. It suggests reluctance of the speaker to make the statement or a passive inquiry to others whether they have questions regarding the statement.
A: ニッキーさんはいますか？
B: はい、私はニッキーですけど。（私をお呼びですか？）

And more importantly, does it matter where I place it? Should I even bother with adding "but"? And does my japanese sentence make sense? Would it change the meaning if I used 「だけど」 oｒ「けれども」？

Yes, your sentence makes sense. To mean "but," it should be at the beginning of the second one. "Dakedo," "keredomo," "demo" and "kedo" are all OK.

I also want to add "I think".
私は春と秋が好きです。秋に、木々は、よりきれいですと思います。
It is ok to add 「と思う」 onto 「です」? I've never seen it used with desu. I only ever see it used with verbs. Then again I don't get to see natural written japanese that much...
助けてください！

To add "...to omou," you have to change "desu"
けど、秋は、木々がきれいだと思います。
(I omitted one "ten" because there are too many.)

To Bucko & Kat:
I wrote this before I noticed your posts but am posting as is, because I don't have the time to edit it :sorry:

Kuzzy · 29 Jan 2006

Please don't take my word for it, but I'd like to try for my own benefit.

私は、春と秋が好きです。でも、秋の景色はもっと美しいと思います。

Nicky · 29 Jan 2006

みんな、ありがとう！ I thought that です + と思う was funky looking. But I couldn't figure out why.

KrazyKat as of now I only know of i-adjectives and na-adjectives, which one would be considered "true adjectives".

Do I have to place haru in front of yori? I always thought yori+adjective meant "adjective + er". I was trying to make a sentence that was a little easier on my mind, and one that had a meaning closer to "the tree's are prettier in autumn" Instead of "autumn's trees are prettier than spring's trees.

KrazyKat · 29 Jan 2006

Nicky said:
みんな、ありがとう！ I thought that です + と思う was funky looking. But I couldn't figure out why.
KrazyKat as of now I only know of i-adjectives and na-adjectives, which one would be considered "true adjectives".
Do I have to place haru in front of yori? I always thought yori+adjective meant "adjective + er". I was trying to make a sentence that was a little easier on my mind, and one that had a meaning closer to "the tree's are prettier in autumn" Instead of "autumn's trees are prettier than spring's trees.

i-adjectives are true adjectives. na-adjectives are actually nouns. Often called adjectival nouns, kirei is one of these.

There are basically two ways to make comparisons in japanese.
1) X no hou gai ADJ Lit X's 'way' is more ADJ

2) X wa Y yori ADJ ie. X is more ADJ than Y.
yori is more like 'than' than 'er'

epigene · 29 Jan 2006

Nicky,

You don't have to add "haru" before "yori" because you have already stated you like both spring and autumn. The comparison is already understood.

KrazyKat · 29 Jan 2006

epigene said:
Nicky,
You don't have to add "haru" before "yori" because you have already stated you like both spring and autumn. The comparison is already understood.

epignene are you saying to leave yori out altogether or just not put haru in.
I've never seen yori without the thing that is 'less' right inforntﾂ、can you really do that? Maybe because 'no hou' would be more natural in palces like there it's just never used?

epigene · 29 Jan 2006

Kat,

To language learners, the standard form "haru yori kirei" is taught as the basic form, and it is of course correct (maybe more correct because it makes the comparison clearer).

But, you can say "yori kirei" and skip "haru" if it has already been mentioned. Context is very important in Japanese, and omission occurs frequently.

KrazyKat · 29 Jan 2006

Thanks, I'm clear now.

epigene · 29 Jan 2006

FYI, this is a summary of an article I found on the Web:

Reading Comprehension and Omission
Satoru Ishikawa and Yoshiko Jo, Princeton University

Students of Japanese language face various difficulties in reading comprehension arising out of omission, inversion, relative clause, absence of demonstrative pronouns, differences in writing styles and lack of cultural knowledge.

However, the student of Japanese seems to experience the greatest difficulty dealing with omission both in reading and listening. Although omission is a characteristic of many languages, in Japanese it is particularly common. Kuno ( Kuno Susumu, Danwa no bunpoo [Tokyo: Taishuukan, 1978]) studied the mechanism of omission in Japanese, and found several rules of omission, some of which were shared by other languages. As a general principle, omission occurs when an element is "recoverable" from the linguistic or the extralinguistic context. As for the order of omission, older information tend to be omitted first. Kuno also pointed out that there are Japanese specific conditions under which omission occurs. In Japanese many words can be deleted as the language is strongly context-based. In particular, the omission of a topic (an element marked by the topic marker wa) occurs in Japanese under conditions which differ from English.

I think you can do some research on this on your own.

Nicky · 29 Jan 2006

So I'm right about leaving haru off? Yay! I was trying to combat redundancy. I know about the "X no hou gai ADJ" form but for some reason it didn't come to mind when I was trying to write my sentence. =/

Nicky · 30 Jan 2006

Bucko said:
秋も春も好きだが秋の葉の方がきれいだと思います。

Ok I like this sentence, but what's the second "no" for.

秋の葉 (autumns leaves) の (?)

Does the second no turn "leaf" into "leaves"? Or is it the "explainer no"?

KrazyKat · 30 Jan 2006

Nicky said:
Ok I like this sentence, but what's the second "no" for.
秋の葉 (autumns leaves) の (?)

Does the second no turn "leaf" into "leaves"? Or is it the "explainer no"?

you'll kick yourself for this but the second no is to make 'no hou ga kirei' ie in the form we had above 'aki no ha' is X. So its the possessive no in order to make 'the way' of 'autumn's leaves'

'no' wouldn't make a noun plural, and I'm not sure what you mean by an 'explainer no'?

The7thSamurai · 30 Jan 2006

KrazyKat said:
Wouldn't desu ga and desu keredomo be more apporpriate?

Ah, maybe? The only reason I wrote "da ga/keredomo" was because of the whole ending sentences with the politness indicator thing. Maybe one of the more advanced speakers on here can tell me whether we can put desu in the middle of a "but" sentence.

The7thSamurai · 30 Jan 2006

Nicky said:
Ok I like this sentence, but what's the second "no" for.
秋の葉 (autumns leaves) の (?)
Does the second no turn "leaf" into "leaves"? Or is it the "explainer no"?

Yeah, I don't know if that's right either. That basically says "autumn's leaves", but the の might not be needed. The second の is necessary as it's part of the "no hou ga ii" sentence structure which is how you say something is better. "hou" means "side" or "way", so what you'd actually be saying is "autumn's leaves' side is more beautiful", or "the way of autumn's leaves is more beautiful".

moofs · 30 Jan 2006

秋の葉 should be correct. In this sense it's more like "leaves of autumn", which is almost same as "autumn's leaves". It's like アメリカの大学 would be American College/University and not "America's college".

Like Bucko said, you can think of のほう(の being a possessive particle here) being as "someone's side". Usually when you compare between things, you take one side or the other. One guy says spring leaves are prettier and another says autumn leaves are prettier. Which side are you gonna take? Well your answer would be 秋の葉の方がきれいです。 which would mean "Autumn leaves are prettier [than spring leaves]." So you're taking the side of the guy who says autumn leaves are prettier.

Nicky · 30 Jan 2006

I see it now. When I looked at it, I didn't see it as "秋の葉 +の方が" instead my eyes just saw "秋の葉の". I guess my mind just spazzed on me.

KrazyKat said:
I'm not sure what you mean by an 'explainer no'?

I don't know the correct names for these things, but I'm talking about this.

The7thSamurai · 30 Jan 2006

Nicky said:
I see it now. When I looked at it, I didn't see it as "秋の葉 +の方が" instead my eyes just saw "秋の葉の". I guess my mind just spazzed on me.
I don't know the correct names for these things, but I'm talking about this.

Ah yeah I see what you mean. Nah, that's a different の. The ones I used were just possessive. AFAIK, you only use that "explanation" の when either asking someone why or explaining to someone who just asked why.

Nicky · 30 Jan 2006

Ok, that makes sense.Thankies.

Damicci · 30 Jan 2006

Then I have a question:
Mostly you see nohouga listed first in a sentence with yori

but you can make sentences with yori listed first and no houga following.
Which is more commonly used.
I have become accustomed to using yori ~~nohouga~~
たとえば
春より秋の方が好きです。I like Autumn more than Spring.

moofs · 30 Jan 2006

Damicci said:
Then I have a question:
Mostly you see nohouga listed first in a sentence with yori

but you can make sentences with yori listed first and no houga following.
Which is more commonly used.
I have become accustomed to using yori ~~nohouga~~
たとえば
春より秋の方が好きです。I like Autumn more than Spring.

Really? I've mostly seen it as X yori Y no hou ga ADJ desu. At least that's how my textbook taught it, and I don't remember if it taught it any other way.

Damicci · 30 Jan 2006

I made a mistake in that post. I was actually asking which is more commonly used?
I see it written both ways but my friends book has huoga first. so I don't know.

A (not so) quick question about the placement of "but".

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