な Adjective Preceding A Noun
“Until you can see everything in the world as your friend, your work is not done.” - Byron Katie
In the last few pages, you learned all about な adjectives that come after the noun. You learned that you don’t need to add the な in there when you do this. In this lesson, however, you’ll learn about putting a な adjective before the noun (and as I’m sure you’ll remember, this is when you do want the な).
I also recommended you do a quick review of the の particle lesson, since they’re kind of similar. You’ll understand why they’re similar in just a moment.
First, let’s take a look at two simple phrases.
すし が すき です
I like sushi
すきな すし です
The sushi that I like
That right there, in a nutshell, is the difference between the two な adjective types. Here’s what it means, though. Let’s take a look at just part of the second sentence.
すきな すし
The sushi that I like
The translation is a bit off (same meaning, easier to understand, but not literal translation), so you’ll have to be a little flexible here. Think of the above phrase as one block. It’s the subject of the sentence. When you have a [な adjective + noun] phrase like that, it’s almost like when you were attributing one noun to another with the の particle. For example:
もり の あんどう
Ando (あんどう) of the woods (もり)
This is kind of like the な adjective version of that. We’re attributing a な adjective to a noun, instead of one noun to another noun. Let’s look at more examples.
べんりな マクドナルド
The convenient McDonald’s / The McDonald’s that is convenient
ばかな ボビーさん
The stupid Bobby
けちな お父さん
The stingy father
いじわるな マイケルさん
The mean Michael
I’m hoping you’re starting to get it here. You’re directly describing a noun. You’re attaching the な adjective to that noun, and bundling them together in one convenient べんりな package.
You could, I suppose, just use the phrases above, but they feel a little short. If you want to say a full sentence, then you’ll want to expand a bit. We have multiple ways to do that, but let’s start simple.
しぜんな もり です
It is a natural forest
がんこな 人 でした
(He/she) was a stubborn person
にぎやかな でんしゃ でした
It was a lively train
ゆうめいな 人 ですか？
Are you a famous person?
しょうじきな がくせい じゃありませんでした
He/she was not an honest student
All we’ve done (so far) is add our です’s (etc) onto what you were looking at moments before. From here, though, there are so many directions we can take this. Let’s continue to expand on this concept – it might be a little difficult at first, but stick with it. Everything we’ll be going over you know already (in some form or other!).