peter pan
today i bought a notebook from Taobao it is a black cover notebook designed and manufactured in Taiwan. i love the quotations on every page. wriiten in Japanese. page 1: 中文:我相信人性本善,但是我吃亏了必定以牙还牙,加倍奉还!这就是我的为人原则。 日文:人の善意は信じますが、 やられたらやり返す。倍返 しだ! それが私の流儀なでね。 英文:i believe that people are basically good.But if suffered,i would return in two folds.That's my principle. P.S:it seems like originating from <半沢直樹>
Dec 15, 2014 1:11 PM
Corrections · 5

中文:我相信人性本善,但是我吃亏了必定以牙还牙,加倍奉还!这就是我的为人原则。 

日文:人の善意は信じますが、 やられたらやり返す。倍返 しだ! それが私の流儀なでね。

December 15, 2014

today i bought a notebook from Taobao

it is a black cover notebook designed and manufactured in Taiwan.

i love the quotations on every page. wriiten in Japanese.

page 1:

中文:我相信人性本善,但是我吃亏了必定以牙还牙,加倍奉还!这就是我的为人原则。
日文:人の善意は信じますが、 やられたらやり返す。倍返 しだ! それが私の流儀なでね。
英文:i believe that people are basically good.But if suffered,i would return in two folds.That's my principle.

P.S:it seems like originating from <半沢直樹>

 

Hello Peter Pan,

 

Please excuse the long explanation, but I thought the sentence was very interesting and very hard to translate so I became interested in finding a very good translation.  I cannot read chinese, but here is my (fluent english) translation of the japanese sentence.

 

-----------

I believe that people are basically good, but if made to suffer I return it twofold as a matter of principle.

-----------

 

--> It's important to use "I" and not "i" for first person

--> Using "But" at the beginning of a sentence is not correct, but it is awkward.  In this situation it is better to use ", but" as a conjunction. 

--> After "," the space is very important.

--> twofold is a single word.  It is very uncommon (it is an 800 year old word used in formal  expressions) but it works very well in this sentence because the sentence is a vow.  Also, twofold is an adverb, not a noun, so it cannot be the object of the preposition "in".  

--> "That's my principle." Is correct english, but the phrase "as a matter of principle" is always used in this kind of sentence.  There is no rule for it, but it is always done this way (colloquial expression).

January 31, 2015
Want to progress faster?
Join this learning community and try out free exercises!