First of, I know that directly translating from Japanese to English will be counterproductive most of the time. But as a beginner I need to get some bearing on the function of certain components of the language in order to understand how the components are used. The typical textbook and general translation of the は particle as stated in the title has for the most part been a useful explanation for the function of this particle. What seems to be a more “correct” description of this particle is that it is a topic marker. But then I come across this sentence on Bunpro:
彼はいつも変な事言っているけど、本当は真面目なようだ。
Bunpro translates this sentence as:
“He is always saying strange things, but it appears that he is really a serious person.”
Neither “as for really”, or “really” being the topic of the second part of this sentence makes any sense to me. Therefore I’m wondering if there is another “translation” or way to view this particle, or if the function it serves here relates more to the sentence structure as a whole in a way I’m not aware of.
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3 comments
Think of it like, “actually”, in contrast to the previous sentence. “You think this, but as for the truth, it’s actually this”.
Another common use of は is as a contrastive, which is what is happening here. His usual behaviour is being compared with this present instance.
I think 本当 can work as a topic. Note that 本当 is a noun, not just a na adjective, and it means truth/reality/fact (in this case), so you can interpret it as: “talking about how the facts really are, …”.
Also, I’m no Japanese expert but I have done my dose of immersion the last 2 years, and using 本当+は is pretty much a set structure for saying “actually” or “but in reality”, so you’re not likely to encounter it as 本当が (I guess you didn’t ask for comparison with が but the roles of が and は are often confusing at the beginning).
Note that は is also contrastive, in the sense that it can be used to contrast different topics and the takes on those topics (I’ll keep it short, if you’re interested here’s some grammar a https://imabi.org/the-particle-wa-%e3%81%af-i-the-topic-contrast-marker/), and I do feel like は in 本当は has that contrastive role.