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I’ve been learning Japanese for a few years. The basic translation here is close, but it still sorta keeps the non sequitur: they’re nice AND ALSO easy to move

I’ve been learning Japanese for a few years. The basic translation here is close, but it still sorta keeps the non sequitur: they’re nice AND ALSO easy to move in. But these are not meant to be independent statements. Part of the problem is that Japanese does this thing where they label whole statements as “good” with いい. To me, he’s really just saying “it’s great how comfy shorts are!”. If you translate it robotically, he says “speaking of moving easily, shorts are good!” But we don’t judge clothes like this in English, so it’s weird sounding

Centigonal 4y ago
so something like "when it comes to moving easily, shorts are good!" ?
fenomas 4y ago
TFA's version is right. "Shorts" is the topic word (the topic particle after it is implied), and the "easy to move" and "good" parts both modify "shorts". So robotically, "speaking of shorts, they're easy to move in and good" or the like.
ramchip 4y ago
That sounds odd to me. If you say このリュックは大きくて便利 it's clearly the backpack that's convenient, not the statement, so why would 大きくていい be different?
- biophysboy 4y ago
  I see what you mean. I was stuck on the “って”. I think I misread a bit.
  - mahoho 4y ago
    I think you're correct about the two statements not being completely independent, though. In both the shorts and backpack examples the second adjective is meant as a corollary of (or subordinate to) the first. タンパン（は）よくて動きやすいぜ！ or このリュックは便利で大きい both sound unnatural and it seems to me like the logical relationship between the adjectives is lost. The same grammar could technically be used to combine two independent statements, but the context indicates the (pseudo- ?)dependent interpretation. In English we would just say "Shorts are easy to move around in!" and it wouldn't lose any of the semantic meaning, but I do think TFA's "nice and easy" might preserve some of the "feeling" of the Japanese without sounding unnatural like a word-for-word translation would be. I'm not a native speaker though so I could still be completely wrong.
  - fenomas 4y ago
    I see the issue - it looks like it could be a "～って(いうのは)いいぜ" kind of construction. But in that case the preceding bit wouldn't be te form, it would be "動きやすいっていいぜ" or whatever. Rather, the っ here is just an affectation that makes the speech sound a bit childish. What's being said grammatically is just 「動きやすくていいぜ」.

Centigonal 4y ago

so something like "when it comes to moving easily, shorts are good!" ?

fenomas 4y ago

TFA's version is right. "Shorts" is the topic word (the topic particle after it is implied), and the "easy to move" and "good" parts both modify "shorts". So robotically, "speaking of shorts, they're easy to move in and good" or the like.

ramchip 4y ago

That sounds odd to me. If you say このリュックは大きくて便利 it's clearly the backpack that's convenient, not the statement, so why would 大きくていい be different?

biophysboy 4y ago
I see what you mean. I was stuck on the “って”. I think I misread a bit.
- mahoho 4y ago
  I think you're correct about the two statements not being completely independent, though. In both the shorts and backpack examples the second adjective is meant as a corollary of (or subordinate to) the first. タンパン（は）よくて動きやすいぜ！ or このリュックは便利で大きい both sound unnatural and it seems to me like the logical relationship between the adjectives is lost. The same grammar could technically be used to combine two independent statements, but the context indicates the (pseudo- ?)dependent interpretation. In English we would just say "Shorts are easy to move around in!" and it wouldn't lose any of the semantic meaning, but I do think TFA's "nice and easy" might preserve some of the "feeling" of the Japanese without sounding unnatural like a word-for-word translation would be. I'm not a native speaker though so I could still be completely wrong.
- fenomas 4y ago
  I see the issue - it looks like it could be a "～って(いうのは)いいぜ" kind of construction. But in that case the preceding bit wouldn't be te form, it would be "動きやすいっていいぜ" or whatever. Rather, the っ here is just an affectation that makes the speech sound a bit childish. What's being said grammatically is just 「動きやすくていいぜ」.