Ohhh, a new week already! I will read it today and check this thread:3
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I was wondering about that too. 任せ (as a noun) can be used as a suffix (in this case for 私, there’s no に in there). Looking at it as a noun, it makes sense that it’s で (as て-form of だ).
This interpretation also makes more sense in context. While 私に任せて (thinking of 任せで simply as a weird て-form voicing) would mean “leave it to me, I’ll do it”,
私任せで implies “you have it easy (ちーちゃんはいいよね), simply leaving everything troublesome up to me”
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I have a quick and probably very dumb grammar question.
On page 62 the sentence やどりできる場所があってよかったね
The meaning is pretty obvious but I was wondering what exactly is going on between やどりできる and 場所
I mean the noun 場所 is getting modified by やどりできる but I was under the impression that the verb should be in past form to modify a noun. Obviously I’m missing something here
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Where did you get that impression from? Past form is definitely not necessary, it only needs to be short form (which can also be negative or past or both).
Since they’re talking about a place where they are able to stay overnight now, not where they were able to stay in the past, the present tense would be more appropriate.
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That makes perfect sense actually, but for some reason I thought the verb needed to be conjugated in some way to modify the noun. All the examples I found were always in た or ている form so I guess I convinced myself those were the only ways to do it.
Thanks a lot!
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By “short form”, do you mean “plain form”?
You don’t know about short form? And long form, fancy form, short continuous, future perfect middle, etc
Hit the books kiddo
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Yeah, probably. I knew it wasn’t called dictionary form, but I didn’t remember what it’s called in English.
Is there even a collective Japanese term for the plain form?
In books for language learners (like shin kanzen master) they call it 普通形 (normal form). But I don’t know if this term is actually used in 国語 class in elementary school in Japan…
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Ahhh… feels good to catch up after being a week behind on the previous chapter.
( ;﹏; ) So sad for the book being burnt. She already only had so few books. Thank god they made up with the cute and accurate drawing … I hate people messing up with my books, so I totally understand her feeling.
Quick question:
p66- How does one break down the sentence 昔のことを知ることができるのも本のおかげだしね? I understand the first part 昔のことを知ることができる, but unsure about the latter part of the sentence.
Thank you!
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Summary
Always start from the end!
本のおかげ+だ+し+ね
(And) it’s thanks to books.
Now, what is the “it”? It’s
昔のことを知ることができる
の is there to nominalise the sentence も is just the “too” particle
To be able to know things of the past
→ And it’s also thanks to books that we can know about the past, right.
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Thank you! I had difficulties breaking this properly. At first I thought it’s something like おかげ出す, but that didn’t yield any meaning (and the conjugation also didn’t make sense). It makes sense now. Let me see if I get all the grammar points right:
Summary
(An implied topic, probably 私達は?)
＋昔のことを知る＋ことができる = know about the past (thing) + can/able to = able to know about the past.
＋の＋も = nominalizer + also
＋ほんのおかげだ＋し = the aid of books + because = Because of the aid of books.
＋ね
= We are able to know about the things from the past because of the aid of the books, right?
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I’m struggling with page 62:
私たちは建物に入り入り口を雪で固めた
保温のために役に立つ
有機物の廃材あったのは幸いだった
My best crack at this is taking it as one giant sentence where the main clause is “私は… 幸いだった”:
“[私たちは] As for us, [建物に入り] entering a building, [入り口を雪で固めた] the entrance frozen by snow, [保温のために役に立つ有機物の廃材あったのは] having scrap wood for warmth, [幸いだった] [we] were lucky.”
But I don’t really get how “建物に入り” is working in this sentence since it seems like a noun-y clause with no verb, and I also don’t understand what the “は” towards the end of the sentence is doing.
Would appreciate any pointers! 
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I haven’t got the book on me to check, but this is where she’s writing in the journal, yes? It’s not one giant sentence.
The first 入り is the literary style of using the ます-stem in place of て-form, and should be followed by a comma.
私たちは建物に入り、入り口を雪で固めた。
We went into a building, and packed the entrance with snow. (固める definition 4).
保温のために役に立つ
(That) should assist in keeping warm.
有機物の廃材あったのは幸いだった
Fortunately, there’s scrap organic matter (to use as fuel)
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Whew, thanks! First time I’ve seen the pre-ます stem used in place of -て.
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@Belthazar gave a really good answer. Just going to address this portion above in more details. The は here marks the topic of the sentence. The の before it is a nominalizer that turns the statement before it into a noun to be used for the topic. Roughly:
有機物の廃材のは - Speaking of (the topic: the scrap organic matter),
幸いだった - It was fortunate.
Since a sentence can’t have two topic, you can’t make this part of that huge writing and then add an implied topic before that. So either break that writing into multiple sentences (the right approach for this case) or try to interpret everything before は as the topic. Sometime the latter is indeed the right way, I’ve seen crazy long and complicated topic in a sentence.
It is mostly used in writing, with stiffer/more literary feel. IIRC, Tobira teaches it (at least that’s where I think I learned it from).
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Wow, this chapter is a tough one. I’m still working my way through it. Thanks for all the comments and deconstructions!
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This makes me wonder… Why would she say scrap organic matter and not wood and paper? Is it because of the post-apocalyptic world they live in? Or just because it’s a very formal way to write a journal?
I figured it’s because it’s post-apocalyptic. I get the impression that most of the city is just metal, concrete and snow.
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That part was so cute. I love Yu. She tries, at least.
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