What is the difference in usage and meaning between 勝たねば and 勝たなければ? I have only learnt how 勝つ get conjugated to be 勝たなければ. How does 勝たねば come about?
試合の終わりには、どちらかが勝たねばならない。 (source)
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What is the difference in usage and meaning between 勝【か】たねば and 勝【か】たなければ?
My perspective is as a learner of Japanese and not as a native speaker. 勝【か】たねば sounds more formal and stuffy to me, borderline Classical Japanese, something I'd only expect to see in writing. It's also possible that this form is used more in certain dialects or regional variants that I'm not familiar with.
Meanwhile, 勝【か】たなければ sounds more regular, everyday, modern, the kind of conjugation form I'm used to both hearing and reading.
I defer to native speakers for a fuller discussion of differences in nuance.
How does 勝たねば come about?
Let's break down 勝【か】たねば into its constituent pieces.
- 勝【か】た～ is the 未然形【みぜんけい】 or "irrealis" ("hasn't happened yet") stem of the verb 勝【か】つ ("to win"). This stem is used to to construct the plain-form negative 勝【か】たない, so sometimes this might also be called the "negative" stem.
- ね is the 已然形【いぜんけい】 ("realis" stem, "has happened") or 仮定形【かていけい】 ("hypothetical" stem) of the Classical Japanese negative verb ending ～ず. You generally only encounter this in writing or formal speech situations. In everyday speech, the ～ず ending has been replaced by the ～ない ending.
This izenkei form is vaguely similar to the subjunctive seen in many European languages. It's used to talk about things as if they have happened, or as if they could happen. This is the verb stem used with the conditional or hypothetical ～ば ending.- As the hypothetical stem of the negative suffix, this ～ね～ is functionally equivalent to modern ～なけれ～.
- ば is the conditional verb suffix. This is used to express a necessary condition for the following clause. It's often translated simply as "if", and it has overtones of "if
[VERB], then[some other thing]", or even "only if[VERB], then[some other thing]".
Please comment if the above does not fully address your questions, and I can edit to update.
answered Apr 23, 2021 at 18:31
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the ending ~ず is still present in some areas of everyday speech alongside ~ない, isn't it? e.g. 寝坊してしまったので朝ごはんを食べず出勤した。 Commented Apr 23, 2021 at 21:23
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@jarmanso7: ～ず is more prevalent, and ～ぬ also still shows up with somewhat less frequency. But ～ねば, I don't think I've ever encountered that in conversation, only in writing. Commented Apr 23, 2021 at 21:25
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1@EiríkrÚtlendi: I found a few spoken voicelines in a recent popular game that include 〜ねば: 「今回はたまたま無事だったけど、なんかあったら…あいつに一言注意してやらねばな。」,「手伝ってくれてありがとう。私はこれから盗人を探しに行かねば。では…」,「危険はないが、いつも回り道をして竹を取らねばならんのだ…」,「前回は君のおかげで助かった、君にはちゃんと礼を言わねばならないな。」,「ハハッ、{NICKNAME}、この件はお前に礼を言わねばならない。」,「「契約」の国は仙人に感謝せねばならん。しかしここ数年、仙人の力を頼らずとも、璃月は安定しておる。」It is worth noting that almost all of these are spoken by elderly people in the game. Commented Apr 24, 2021 at 3:52
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Thanks a lot, Eiríkr Útlendi. It is a very detailed explanation. While I have you there, could I ask why the ~ば form in the dictionary is called "provisional" while the ~たら form is called conditional. I realized that you called ば as the conditional verb suffix. 'Provisional" means temporary to me.– HealerCommented Apr 28, 2021 at 4:03
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@Healer: English-language terminology to describe Japanese grammar is ... unsettled, might be the best way to put it. Different writers use different words, often depending on their background and the intended audience for whatever they're writing. Looking specifically at ～ば and ～たら, ～ば generally describes something that must happen for the following thing to occur. I suppose some authors might view that as "the piece before the ～ば is the provision -- provided that ～ば happens, then whatever comes next is possible." ～たら is less specific, and is more "well, if A happens, then B." Commented Apr 28, 2021 at 22:06