Magical Power of Suru. Nobuo Sato

      Introduction

      Many students of the Japanese language find themselves stumped and frustrated by the complexity and variety of Japanese verbs, their conjugations, and their often ambiguous contexts. The mind-numbing task of memorizing them all is sometimes enough to daunt even the most ganbarō student of the language. This book is intended to ease this tremendous burden. How? Via the magical power of suru, of course!

      The Japanese verb suru is roughly equivalent to the English "to do" or “to make." In English, these verbs are sometimes used in combination with various nouns to create verbal idioms or compound verbs. For example, “to do" combined with "laundry" means to wash one's laundry, and "to make" combined with “(a) reservation" means to reserve something in advance. Likewise, the verb suru can be combined with not only nouns but adjectives, loanwords, onomatopoeia, and other verbs, as well. Suru is thereby capable of creating a wide variety of versatile verbal phrases or compound verbs. And the best part is that students can increase their fluency by relying on just one conjugation pattern! This unique function of suru can be a great relief to serious students of the Japanese language. Compound-suru verbs are so commonly used that they can virtually replace the majority of regular Japanese verbs, the conjugations of which would otherwise have to be painstakingly memorized one by one.

      Here are some examples of noun-suru combinations:

      junbi-suru 準備する junbi (preparation) + suru

      • to prepare

      Asu no jugyō o junbi-shinakereba narimasen.

      I must prepare for tomorrow's classes.

      yoyaku-suru 予約する yoyaku (reservation) + suru

      • to make a reservation

      Yoyaku-shitai no desu ga.

      I'd like to make a reservation, please.

      These compound-suru verbs are undoubtedly familiar to any intermediate student of Japanese. But wait. There's more! Through the magic of suru, those pernicious loanwords and onomatopoeia can be easily incorporated into your everyday speech.

      memorii-suru メモリーする memorii (memorize) + suru

      • to memorize

      Korera no dōshi no katsuyō o zenbu memori-shina-kutemo yoi to wa ureshii desu ne!

      I'm glad I don't have to memorize all those complicated verb conjugations!

      chin-suru チンする chin (automatic alarm sound of a microwave oven) + suru

      • to cook with a microwave oven

      Saikin isogashii node insutanto shokuhin o denshi-renji de chin-shite imam.

      I just cook instant food with a microwave oven, since I'm so busy these days.

      Additionally, almost all adjectives can be combined with sum, as in the following examples. Note that adjectives end with i when modifying nouns. When combined with suru, however, the final i becomes ku, as in the following examples:

      usuku-suru 薄く する usui (thin) + suru

      • to make thin

      Tsugi no pankēki wa chotto usuku-shite kudasai.

      Make the next pancake a little thinner.

      tanoshiku-suru 楽しく する tanoshii(pleasant, fun) + suru

      • to make pleasant or fun

      Moshi Amaria ga itara, pātii o tanoshiku-shite kureru to omoimasu ne!

      If Amalia's here, she's sure to make the party fun!

      This way of using suru has recently become so fashionable in contemporary Japanese that new words are being created almost daily. It's an amusing and playful