1

Is the 2nd image (one below the google translate) more accurate? Is the のですが just completely wrong or?

Also I know the Google translate is wrong at the end because I accidentally had a new line after "call".

enter image description here

1 Answer 1

1

Both machine translations are not very natural. I would translate this as:

I want to call him but I'm sleep so I won't call him tonight.

  • 彼に電話したいですが、眠いので今夜はしません。
  • 彼に電話をしたいですが、眠いので今晩はやめておきます。

Either way, の before ですが is perfectly natural. This type of の is called explanatory-の, and it's perfectly natural to use it to set up a context, as in your sentence. See the "preliminary remarks" section in the linked article. See also: What is the meaning of ~んです/~のだ/etc?

Besides, you need a contrastive-は after 今夜/今晩. This is something easily forgotten by English speakers, but it's important.

4
  • does it still sound natural without the の?
    – user71207
    Mar 3, 2022 at 3:29
  • @user71207 It's still valid without の, but の is strongly desirable at least in this context. I don't know the exact rules regarding when の is optional in "preliminary remarks".
    – naruto
    Mar 3, 2022 at 3:32
  • Also I am curious, why do you use だめ in katakana in your user profile?
    – user71207
    Mar 3, 2022 at 4:12
  • @user71207 japanese.stackexchange.com/a/15102/5010
    – naruto
    Mar 3, 2022 at 4:55

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .