Also if you’re ever concerned about having done something wrong there’s a preview button too, which will show you if all the stuff you put in worked before you actually post it. I’ve had really long spoilers break before and had to reformat them before fixing. I’ve also had quotations act a little whacky. So I usually check.
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I’m working on this clause:
祈りをこめて思わずにはいられなかった
Something like: She couldn’t help thinking of prayers or something like that?
If possible, try to give page numbers with your questions. I understand if you’re on kindle or whatever though.
I think it’s important to keep the part just before what you quoted.
暖かさを祈りをこめて思わずに
I would break this down like this:
暖かさを ー 祈りをこめて ー 思わずに
what she (can’t help but) think is of the warmth, and she’s thinking of it… prayerfully, I guess. With a prayer. Like she’s praying. I can’t make this make sense in English aaahhh.
〜をこめて is a way to express that you’re doing something with some feeling or similar. Like 愛をこめて equates to the English letter-writing closing of “with love.”
Page 26
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Where is this sentence? Context would probably help.
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Found it, though it’s page 24 in my version for some reason (Kadokawa Bunko)
The sentence was cut short too. It ends with 思わずにはいられなかった. ずに is a kind of negative conjugation which can often be interpreted as “without doing [verb]”, and together with いられない (verb いる, “to exist” for animate objects) it means that the speaker “can’t exist without doing [verb]”, or in more natural English, “can’t help but [verb]”.
So it ultimately means that Kazuko couldn’t help but think of the warmth, like @QuackingShoe said.
For completeness and tradition, here’s a dictionary entry for ずにはいられない (the interpretation with ずに and the negative of いる is personal, though it’s what makes sense to me):
ある感情や動作をおさえようと思ってもおさえることができない意を表す。…ないではいられない。どうしても…してしまう。「おかしくて笑わ―◦ない」
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Oops yes, it’s page 26 of Tsubasa bunko—apologies
That’s a useful construction—the “with love” comparison helps
Thank you!! Very helpful!
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Sorry, didn’t bother going into that because your translation already included that bit so I thought you knew it. Oops!
Here’s my effort at the first page of ch4, TsubasaBunko page 26:
It’s kinda wonky in spots, but I did my best:
Bewildered, various things rushed into her mind and passed through. To die! To nearly die by a car! Kazuko shivered. If this was going to happen, she would rather be asleep. But it was already late. Kazuko couldn’t help but think of the warmth inside that bed. Of course, these thoughts were instantaneous things; in due time, the truck’s huge tires rotated to Kazuko and there was a weird vibration of the asphalt road. Further, kazuko’s eyes closed more strongly. That’s not good! But for two, three, ten seconds more, nothing happened at all. What happened? Kazuko’s eyes closed? and she lost consciousness. Imperceptibly, a warm feeling. Before death, wanting the feeling of the soft peace inside that bed, kazuko learned she was returned to her surroundings.
車にひかれる is to be hit by a car
もっと寝ていればよかった is she should have slept more/she wished she’d slept more
You skipped 寝不足でぼんやりしていたものだからこんなことになったのだわ！ Which is it was because she was spacing out from lack of sleep that it came to this!
だがもうおそかった it was already too late
和子はあのベッドの中のこころよい暖かさを祈りをこめて思わずにはいられなかった is Kazuko couldn’t help but think longingly of the comforting warmth of her bed.
The next part saysthat the spinning of the tires caused the asphalt road to shake frighteningly.
さらに、さらに強く和子は目をとじた means that she closed her eyes tighter and tighter.
いつのまにか refers to something happening before you know it.
Finally, 死の前に彼女が望んだ、ベッドの中のやわらかい安らぎの感覚が、自分の周囲によみがえっているのを知った is complicated and I’d love someone else’s input on it. But the way I understand it…
死の前に彼女が望んだ and ベッドの中の柔らかい安らぎの are modifying 感覚 (or maybe 望んだ is modifying 安らぎ, which makes more sense to me?), and that 感覚 does the よみがえっている, and 自分の周囲 is what causes it to よみがえっている, and she 知った that.
Which I guess I’d translate roughly as her surroundings waking her to the soft, comforting in-bed feeling she wished for before death.
It throws me a lot, because by my reading, the same peaceful 感覚 that she desires is the same 感覚 that gets revived in an expression, which just does not make any sense in English. Because it would mean something like “She came back to her sense of being comfortable” which just doesn’t work. But I’ve seen that kind of thing before in Japanese and it seems to be fine. I’m still strugging with it. Someone please correct me.
Mngh. Japanese.
Anyway. A lot of your readings of the sentences don’t seem to be keeping close track of the particles. You seem to be jumbling around what is doing what to what a little, so my advise would be to work through the particles.
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Yep, I def missed causal connection between the tires rotating and the Road shaking. (My grammar may not yet be strong enough for figuring out some of these connections).
The complete sentence starts with いつのまにか、暖かい感触が. I interpreted 自分の周囲に as “around herself”.
At some time or other she noticed that the warm feeling is being restored around her - the feeling of the soft comfort of her own bed she wished of before her death.
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I have so many questions! But here are two:
- on page 28 Tsubasa bunko:
すべて二度めである
I get all, second time, で, there is and I’m not sure what that amounts to. The de is marking means?
- page 27, the grammar on this: じゅうぶん学校に間に合う時間である。 I get enough, school, in, to be on time, time, で, there is and can’t quite figure what’s causing what. there is enough time to be on time to school? But then why is enough attached to school and not time?.
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It’s kind of late for me, so maybe someone else can give you a more thourough explanation, but for である, it’s just a grammar point and a bit similar to だ/です:
Formal expressions - Tae Kim's Japanese grammar guide (This is just the first thing that showed up on google, I didn’t actually read through it, but you can probably find something else about it if this isn’t helpful)
I’m afraid I can’t say much about the second one except that changing the word order the way you asked about makes it feel weird to me(but you could rephrase it in other ways and still have it make sense), so maybe someone else can explain that for you. I don’t know if it helps, but I basically just read that sentence as じゅうぶん + 学校に間に合う時間 + である so if I were to break it down similarly to the way you did it, I guess it’d be "enough, time to make it in time to school, there is. I’m sure someone else will come along to help you eventually in case my explanations don’t make sense.(or if some part of it is wrong, but cause I cannot make any guarantees about how accurate my grammar explanations are late at night)
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I wouldn’t say じゅうぶん is attached to 学校. In Japanese I think the only words that are actually attached to anything are particles. For example, the に in 学校に is certainly attached to 学校.
Adverbs in Japanese have some freedom in terms of word order. I think (someone correct me if I’m wrong) it would also be correct to write 学校にじゅうぶん間に合う時間である.
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Aw shucks 
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I forgot one—is this a character name? I didn’t see it in the vocabulary or in Jisho and then Google searching it sends me to this book. It’s on page 27 and 28, and I see the first two of the kanji again on 29: 浅倉吾朗. Sorry if I’m missing something obvious! I didn’t read the first 2.5 chapters so it might be because of that
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