Yesterday, I translated the full lyrics of the song 小さな恋のうた（ちいさなこいのうた）by Mongol800.

Today, however, I want to talk about everyone's worst nightmare: GRAMMAR!

Specifically, I want look at 3 different grammar points, all of which show up in a single line of the chorus:

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

Translating this sentence was quite a problem for me, and I'll tell you why a bit later in this lesson.

First, let's look at the three grammar points we'll explore:

Grammar #1 - PERSON + にとって

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

Grammar #2 - すぐ + PLACE PRONOUN

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

Grammar #3 - The More & More ほど

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

Grammar Breakdown... Initiate!
🐻　🐻　🐻　🐻　🐻　🐻　🐻　🐻　

#1 - PERSON + にとって

This little bit of JLPT N3 grammar means...

*Pulls out grammar book.*

～にとって
＝～の立場から考えると
～にとって
イコール　～の　たちば　から　かんがえる　と
= for ~; from the point of view of ~
Note: A person comes before (or in the English translation, after) the ～.

After "PERSON + にとって," usually a phrase expressing an evaluation or opinion will follow.

Examples...

私にとって、仕事は全然大事じゃない。
わたし　に　とって、　しごと　は　ぜんぜん　だいじ　じゃ　ない。
Work isn't important to me at all.
Literally: "me + from the point of view of, + work / job + は + not at all + important + is not."

あなたにとって、一番好きな時間はいつですか。
あなた　に　とって、　いちばん　すきな　じかん　は　いつ　です　か。
(For you), What is your favorite time of day?
Literally: "you + from the point of view of, + number-one + liking + time + は + when + is + か."

レイにとって、どれが一番いい？
レイ　に　とって、　どれ　が　いちばん　いい？
Which one do you like best? // Which one does Rei like best?
Literally: "Rei + from the point of view of, + which + が + number-one + good?"

❈　Nuance Note #1　❈

You can also insert は after ～にとって, which places a greater emphasis on the fact that this is the person in question's opinion.

For example, if I add は to these sentences, it sounds like I am explicitly pointing out that this is my opinion, but other people may (and likely do) have differing opinions:

私にとっては仕事は全然大事じゃない。
わたし　に　とって　は、　しごと　は　ぜんぜん　だいじ　じゃ　ない。
Work isn't important to me at all.
Literally: "me + from the point of view of + は + work / job + は + not at all + important + is not."
Note: That bold and italicized "me" might seem a bit rude, but I don't think the Japanese sounds rude at all.

❈　Nuance Note #2　❈

For the questions, why can't I just say something like the following?

レイはどれが一番いい？
レイ　は　どれ　が　いちばん　いい？
Which one do you like best? // Which one does Rei like best?
Literally: "Rei + は + which + が + number-one + good?"

...?

The Answer: You can say something like that.

The nuance is pretty much exactly the same.

✨　Song Translation Note #1　✨

So where is this taking place in our song lyrics?

We have:

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

It seems like it's not even showing in the translation, right?

Well, I almost translated this to, "Look, your most important person is right here beside you," or "Look, for you, the most important person is right here beside you."

BUT!

I didn't think that sounded as natural.

Also, the ほら, meaning, "look (at this reality/truth)," coupled with the explanatory の at the end (which is usually feminine but works for this song) create a sense that the singer is trying to convince the "you" in the song that the most important person "for her" is right beside her.

That's how I interpreted it, at least.

It'll probably make more sense once we get through #2 and #3...

Honestly, I'm not sure if I can get away with calling this "grammar."

The word すぐ usually means "immediately; right away; at once."

Like in this sentence:

すぐ行く。
すぐ　いく。
I'll leave right away. // I'll go (there) immediately.
Literally: "at once + go."

But sometimes the word also means something a bit like the "right" in "right there" or "right (near)by."

Examples:

すぐ近くにあるよ。
すぐ　ちかく　に　ある　よ。
It's near here. // It's really close by.
Literally: "at once + near + に + is + よ."
Note: For example, if you meet with a friend for lunch, and they ask, "Where's the restaurant?" You could respond with this, which emphasizes that it's not far.

すぐそこにあるよ。
すぐ　そこ　に　ある　よ。
It's right (over) there.
Literally: "at once + there + に + is + よ."
Note: Imagine that you're pointing, for example, to a nearby restaurant that you're about to go to with a friend.

すぐそばにいてね。
すぐ　そば　に　いて　ね。
Stay with me, OK? // Don't leave me, OK?
Literally: "at once + beside + に + be + ね."
Note: For example, if you're shy, and your friend drags you to a party where you don't know anyone, you could say this to your him/her.

Honestly, Rei and I can't think of any other place-related words that attach to すぐ, so just memorize those three:

すぐ近く
すぐそこ
すぐそば

However...

❈　Nuance Note #1　❈

You can't say either of these:

✖　すぐあそこ
　　right over there

あそこ means "(over) there," but it's only used for places that are psychologically far from both the speaker and listener. If someone is talking about something being "right (over) there," then it's NOT psychologically far, so we use すぐそこ. You can't say, It's right way over there, after all.

✖　すぐここ

ここ means "here," but for some reason すぐここ does NOT work for "right here." I have no idea why... sorry. Just be careful that you don't say it.

✨　Song Translation Note #2　✨

So where is this taking place in our song lyrics?

We have:

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

If we could delete the weird and complicated thing happening with ～ほど, which we're going to look at in a second, then we could rewrite this as:

大事な人はすぐそばにいるよ。
だいじな　ひと　は　すぐ　そば　に　いる　よ。
There's an important person right here beside you.
Literally: "important + person + は + at once + beside + に + is + よ."

OK?

OK.

OK. Let's move on, then.

Next we have the grammatical function that was a considerable challenge for me to translate...

#3 - The More & More ほど

ほど is a nasty word for native English speakers.

Typically, it gets translated to "degree" or "extent."

It's grammatical functions can be kind of confusing, though.

I'll introduce them here. But, there's no need to memorize all of this just yet.We'll look at ほど several times in the future.

The basic use of ほど.

The general use of ほど, which we're NOT studying today, means something like "to the extent that" or "so much that."

Typically you'll see this as "PLAIN FORM VERB + ほど."

So if we have a verb like 死ぬ（しぬ / "to die"）and an adjective like 寒い（さむい / "cold"）, then we could say:

死ぬほど寒い！
しぬ　ほど　さむい！
It's so cold, I could die! // It's deathly cold!
Literally: "die + extent + cold."

涙が出るほど辛かった。
なみだ　が　でる　ほど　からかった。
It was so spicy, I was crying. // I was tearing up because it was so spicy. // It was so spicy (that) I could have cried.
Literally: "tears + が + come out / exit + extent + was spicy."
Note: The speaker may or may not have actually cried, which is why I have multiple translations.

If I remember correctly, in his book Making Sense of Japanese (not recommended for beginners), translator Jay Rubin calls this the "Johnny Carson ほど."

We'll look at it some other time.

Instead, we're looking at the horrid:

"More & More ほど" (Complicated Version)

Take this English sentence:

The more you eat, the fatter you get.

Now let's rewrite it to have "more" two times:

The more you eat, the more you become fat.

In Japanese (though I've never heard this exact sentence before), that'd be:

食べれば食べるほど太る。
たべれば　たべる　ほど　ふとる。
The more you eat, the more you become fat.
Literally: "if eat + eat + extent + become fat."

Specifically, that's:

ば CONDITIONAL FORM OF VERB-1
+
PLAIN FORM OF VERB-1
+
VERB-2
=
The more you VERB-1, the more you VERB-2.

Yikes.

To make matters worse, it's not always a verb. Sometimes adjectives and nouns are used.

But today we're just looking at a shortened version of this construction.

"More & More ほど" (Simple Version)

In the old version, we could have a sentence like:

日本語は勉強すればするほど難しくなる。
にほんご　は　べんきょう　すれば　する　ほど　むずかしく　なる。
The more you study Japanese, the more difficult it becomes.
Literally: "Japanese + は + studying + if do + do + extent + difficult + becomes."
Note: This is a myth, by the way. Japanese becomes easier the more you study, but the topics become more difficult (or more fun if you're a nerd like me).

That grammar is straight EVIL, yo.

OK. Sure:

日本語は勉強 すれば するほど難しくなる。
↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　　
日本語は勉強 すれば するほど難しくなる。
↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　
日本語は勉強　　　 するほど難しくなる。
↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　↓　
日本語は勉強するほど難しくなる。
にほんご　は　べんきょう　する　ほど　むずかしく　なる。
The more you study Japanese, the more difficult it becomes.
Literally: "Japanese + は + studying + do + extent + difficult + becomes."

Here's our new, simplified formula:

WORD
+
ほど
=
The more you WORD, ...

In our example above, the WORD is a verb. But it could also be an i-adjective...

Imagine that you've moved to Tokyo, and you're talking to your new friends about your apartment search.

One of them asks: How much were you looking to pay for rent?

You could say:

安いほどいい。
やすい　ほど　いい。
The cheaper the better.

Or if they ask about location, you could say:

駅に近いほどいい。
えき　に　ちかい　ほど　いい。
The closer to the station, the better.

Those are with i-adjectives （安い／近い）.

Or the WORD could be a noun, or a na-adjective.

In our song, it's a NOUN!

✨　Song Translation Note #3　✨

ほら
あなたにとって
大事な人ほど
すぐそばにいるの
ほら　
あなた　に　とって　
だいじ　な　ひと　ほど　
すぐ　そば　に　いる　の
Look, the most important person is right here beside you.

This is kind of a weird version of the grammar we just looked at, but here the WORD getting "more & more ほど" love is 人.

Specifically, it's the noun phrase 大事な人（だいじ　な　ひと // important person）.

So in a way, we could quite literally translate this as:

大事な人ほどすぐそばにいる。
だいじな　ひと　ほど　すぐそば　に　いる。
The more important a person is, the closer they'll be to your side.
Literally: "important + person + extent + right beside + に + is."

In the context of the song, I just translated this as, "The most important person is right here beside you."

In other words, I, the singer, am right beside you! Pay attention to me!

That was my interpretation, at least (with a lot of help from Rei). Maybe you can think of an even better translation ^_^.

Happy studies, homies.

Bonus Phrases

ほら、だから言ったでしょ。
ほら、　だから　いった　でしょ。
See? I told you so!