Translating On ne voit bien qu'avec le cœur into Japanese
3. The verbal construction, 'to be able to see':
Starting point : |
On voit les choses avec le cœur |
人は心でものごとを見る hito wa kokoro de monogoto o miru |
The verb in the sentence is 見る miru meaning 'to look' or 'to see'. Using the verb 見る miru without any special ending can indicate habitual action, future tense, or a semi-command or recommendation. At any rate, it will normally be interpreted as meaning 'to look', a purposeful action.
To express the sense of being able to look at something, or see something, a couple of forms are possible. 'One can see with the heart' is as follows:
| Topic/Subject | Prepositional phrase | Object | Verb Construction | |
| 人は hito wa 'person' (topic) |
心で kokoro de 'with the heart' |
ものごとを monogoto o 'thing' (object) |
見れる mireru 'can look at/see' (informal) |
|
| 見る miru 'look at/see' |
ことができる koto ga dekiru 'be able to' |
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But Japanese has a much more natural way of expressing the notion of 'being able to see'. This involves using the intransitive verb 見える mieru 'to be able to see, to be visible'. However, this entails a complete shakeup in the sentence, particularly in the arrangement of subject and object. The reason is that an intransitive verb doesn't have a object. The change is shown in the following table:
| Transitive verb: 見る miru 'to see' | |||
| Topic/Subject | Prepositional phrase | Object | Transitive Verb |
| 人は hito wa 'person' (topic) |
心で kokoro de 'with the heart' |
ものごとを monogoto o 'thing' (object) |
見る miru 'look at/see' |
| Intransitive verb: 見える mieru 'to be able to see, visible' | |||
| Topic/Subject | Prepositional phrase | Intransitive Verb | |
| ものごとは monogoto wa 'thing' (topic) |
心で kokoro de 'with the heart' |
見える mieru 'can be seen' |
|
The transitive verb 見る miru has a subject ('person') and an object ('thing'). With the intransitive verb 見える mieru, 'thing' becomes the subject of the sentence and there's no object.
This change in structure completely alters the landscape of the sentence.
- First, there's no need to worry about translating on 'one', as the sentence no longer needs to mention a human agent.
- Secondly, there's more pressure to make the object explicit, because it's now the topic of the whole sentence.
Result: |
[On] voit les choses avec le cœur |
ものごとは心で見える monogoto wa kokoro de mieru |
GO TO .... previous step: Adding avec le cœur | next step: Adding ne ... que 'only' | Where we started
VARIATION .... in the verb
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