My troubles with transitive/intransitive verb pairs and strategy going forward

[WeebPotato]

Just realized I haven’t read the original post thoroughly enough.

@kchaque

広げる/広げる：
Original meanings: To spread something / To spread out
My meanings: To spread / To spread out
Here, the intransitive verb is already differentiated, so I can simply use “to spread” for the transitive with no complication

I think the second one (intransitive) should be 広がる. The “out” part might add to the meaning and there might be other words in Japanese which fit the bill a little better. I also kept 広げる as “spread out” for lack of a better synonym.

@kchaque

立てる/立つ：
Original meanings: To stand something up / To stand
My meanings: To stand up / To stand

Jisho lists “erect” as one of the meanings of 立てる. Perhaps that also works? However, there is a different 建てる which is closer in meaning to “erect”.

@kchaque

通す/通る：
Original meanings: To let something pass / To pass
My meanings: To let pass / To pass through
This one is also tricky, since the transitive verb does not have the most obvious meaning, ‘to pass something’, but instead means ‘to let something pass’, and therefore cannot use the basic form ‘to pass’. Anyway, I think these are the meanings that will work best for me.

I had the exact same problem… These two eluded me for a long while, because they’re challenging to translate into English. It helped me to look up other words using the 通 kanji .

[plasticlove24]

@AmomentOfMusic

verbs that end in す are transitive

@Nattiness

verbs that end in す are always transitive

In most cases yes, but for example 引き返す can be intransitive meaning “to turn back / to return”.