Welcome to day #3 of the immersion reading project.
After the first two days, your head is probably spinning with all the new words, grammar patterns, and the sheer volume of Japanese text your brain is trying to process. This is all normal! In fact, it means that you are making progress. Keep going, even if it means taking it a bit slower. You can do this!
Please post your responses, questions, etc. to pp. 388-391 of Murakami’s short story「沈黙」below.
Brief update today! Finally got a chance to sit down with the text just now for about an hour, and read the first half of p382. It turns out I missed the last line of p381 and connected the penultimate line to the first line of p382, which... affected the meaning. Just slightly (lol).
It was a pretty comfortable rhythm and pace of scanning the sentence, looking up unknown kanji, and trying to infer the meaning from context (rather than looking up all the grammar structures I don't know, which was distracting), so I think I'm happy with this pace - even though I'll probably have to skip reading fully some of the other comments here to avoid spoilers haha.
In particular, I keep forgetting the meaning of として even though it's come up many times (recently as 何ひとつとして --> not even a single one). Does anyone know the etymology of として / whether it has a kanji version (however rare?)
Since I didn't look any grammar up, I've got some questions to write up tomorrow. But I wonder whether I should ask now about Osawa's speech patterns... maybe I'll ask later once I've compiled some more examples. Good luck everyone with your reading!
Hi all ! I do have a question. On page 390, I just can't make out the meaning of
とくにより好みしなければ (column 7 from the right). Can anyone help ? It's not preventing me from getting the general meaning of the sentence (i just ignored that bit) but I'm really curious as to what it means / what nuance it entails. Thanks !
Day 3 finished. Have still a long way to go but put up with me please. In pg 391, 二回か三回以上は言葉を交わしてなかった。Is this sentence the same as 二回か三回しか言葉を交わしてなかった. And 松本の死は悼んであまりある, what does あまりある add for in this sentence? Also that example where he compared Boeing flying with a wedge in a straight line motion was brilliant.
The story is getting so interesting! I wonder if 青木 is somehow involved in 松本の suicide....I can't wait to keep reading!
It's interesting that there's alternate forms of some words. I came across one in the reading for Day 1 (訊ねる as an alternate reading for 尋ねる) and another in today's (摑む as an alternate reading for 掴む). I wonder why these alternate forms are used!
Hello, just wondering if this is the full version of the story or just a section of it? As other readers have commented, the story is getting so interesting! I'm hooked! I'd like to get my hands on the full version before we finish the project so I can continue right where it ended.
Hello all! I'm not entirely following the pace, I hope that's fine :D
Some notes:
I read the entire first section of the story about the Aoki incident without realizing it was being spoken by Oosawa, I thought it was the other person (first person) narrating his own experience. Let's just say I was slightly confused. xD
I learnt the Kanji of バカ as a combination of a horse and a deer, that was amusing - 馬鹿馬鹿しい
I don't like switching between using kanji and hiragana for words. An example on page 388 would be やつ. こんな奴 -> (2 sentences later) こんなやつ. Is there any particular reason for this changing?
A new "other kanji" for drink 飲む - "呑み込ん" - wasn't expecting this for a super common word like 飲む. "呑み込んでしまったような気分" (p 388)
Question!
Page 385's discussion of how compared to 大沢, 青木 stood out like a "swan in a swamp" (泥沼の中の白鳥みたいに目立ちました)- Is that a reference to anything?
The story is becoming a bit more interesting! The funny thing is that Aoki has done nothing, mostly all of what oozawa has been explaining has been going in his head. The other guy was just living his life and laughed once. Even after getting smacked, Aoki just remained silent and kept on with his life, no threats, no nothing. I'm curious to see how this ends.
Grammar time!
P387 相手が青木でさえなければ僕はそこできちんと謝っていたと思いました。
After some struggling I was able to understand this phrase. Although I'm curious why he used さえ〜ば instead of other conditional forms (Being honest, I don't understand さえ very much)
P388 僕はもう二度と試験勉強に精を出したりはしませんでした。
I don't understand at all why there is a たり in here. I only know the basic たり〜たり list grammar, so seeing just one is strange.
Brief update today! Finally got a chance to sit down with the text just now for about an hour, and read the first half of p382. It turns out I missed the last line of p381 and connected the penultimate line to the first line of p382, which... affected the meaning. Just slightly (lol).
It was a pretty comfortable rhythm and pace of scanning the sentence, looking up unknown kanji, and trying to infer the meaning from context (rather than looking up all the grammar structures I don't know, which was distracting), so I think I'm happy with this pace - even though I'll probably have to skip reading fully some of the other comments here to avoid spoilers haha.
In particular, I keep forgetting the meaning of として even though it's come up many times (recently as 何ひとつとして --> not even a single one). Does anyone know the etymology of として / whether it has a kanji version (however rare?)
Since I didn't look any grammar up, I've got some questions to write up tomorrow. But I wonder whether I should ask now about Osawa's speech patterns... maybe I'll ask later once I've compiled some more examples. Good luck everyone with your reading!
Hi all ! I do have a question. On page 390, I just can't make out the meaning of
とくにより好みしなければ (column 7 from the right). Can anyone help ? It's not preventing me from getting the general meaning of the sentence (i just ignored that bit) but I'm really curious as to what it means / what nuance it entails. Thanks !
Day 3 finished. Have still a long way to go but put up with me please. In pg 391, 二回か三回以上は言葉を交わしてなかった。Is this sentence the same as 二回か三回しか言葉を交わしてなかった. And 松本の死は悼んであまりある, what does あまりある add for in this sentence? Also that example where he compared Boeing flying with a wedge in a straight line motion was brilliant.
Hi everyone,
The story is getting so interesting! I wonder if 青木 is somehow involved in 松本の suicide....I can't wait to keep reading!
It's interesting that there's alternate forms of some words. I came across one in the reading for Day 1 (訊ねる as an alternate reading for 尋ねる) and another in today's (摑む as an alternate reading for 掴む). I wonder why these alternate forms are used!
Evelyn
Hello, just wondering if this is the full version of the story or just a section of it? As other readers have commented, the story is getting so interesting! I'm hooked! I'd like to get my hands on the full version before we finish the project so I can continue right where it ended.
Hello all! I'm not entirely following the pace, I hope that's fine :D
Some notes:
I read the entire first section of the story about the Aoki incident without realizing it was being spoken by Oosawa, I thought it was the other person (first person) narrating his own experience. Let's just say I was slightly confused. xD
I learnt the Kanji of バカ as a combination of a horse and a deer, that was amusing - 馬鹿馬鹿しい
I don't like switching between using kanji and hiragana for words. An example on page 388 would be やつ. こんな奴 -> (2 sentences later) こんなやつ. Is there any particular reason for this changing?
A new "other kanji" for drink 飲む - "呑み込ん" - wasn't expecting this for a super common word like 飲む. "呑み込んでしまったような気分" (p 388)
Question!
Page 385's discussion of how compared to 大沢, 青木 stood out like a "swan in a swamp" (泥沼の中の白鳥みたいに目立ちました)- Is that a reference to anything?
The story is becoming a bit more interesting! The funny thing is that Aoki has done nothing, mostly all of what oozawa has been explaining has been going in his head. The other guy was just living his life and laughed once. Even after getting smacked, Aoki just remained silent and kept on with his life, no threats, no nothing. I'm curious to see how this ends.
Grammar time!
P387 相手が青木でさえなければ僕はそこできちんと謝っていたと思いました。
After some struggling I was able to understand this phrase. Although I'm curious why he used さえ〜ば instead of other conditional forms (Being honest, I don't understand さえ very much)
P388 僕はもう二度と試験勉強に精を出したりはしませんでした。
I don't understand at all why there is a たり in here. I only know the basic たり〜たり list grammar, so seeing just one is strange.