文法の説明

N4 レッスン 4: 12/18

～ておくTo do something in advance

使い方・接続

Verb［て］+ おく
Verb［て］ +とく

詳細

  • 使用域

    一般

  • あまり見かけない漢字

    置く

「ておく」の情報

When the conjunction particle て is followed by the う-Verb 置(お)く in Japanese, it regularly has the meaning of 'to do (A) in advance'. 置(お)く as a verb itself means 'to place something' (down), but also has the nuance 'to leave something alone', or to 'drop something' (like a topic). In this way, ておく can be thought of as meaning 'to do (A) and leave it (until later)'.

When using ておく, the 'future event' that the (A) action is being done for may be something that is coming soon, or may be something that the speaker doesn't want to ever come. Due to this, ておく is also regularly used when the speaker is doing something specifically to prevent another thing from happening.

Caution

ておく is sometimes contracted to とく (or どく in verbs where て would usually be said as で). Although this is not excessively common in conversation, it is very common in drama, manga, and similar media.

関連

例文

--:--

    ここにリモコンを置(お)いておくね。

    I will put the remote here (in advance for future use).

    ちょっと調(しら)べておきます。

    I will do a little research in advance.

    帰(かえ)ってくるのが遅(おそ)くなるから、ご飯(はん)を作(つく)っておいた。

    I won't get home until late, so I made food in advance.

    明日(あした)のパーティーのためにジュースを買(か)っておきました。

    I bought juice (in advance) for the party tomorrow.

    今夜(こんや)明日(あした)のお弁当(べんとう)を作(つく)っておいてくれますか？

    Will you make tomorrow's bento (in advance) for me tonight?

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「ておく」に関する文法ディスカッション

最近の返信 (合計37件)

  • Pushindawood

    Pushindawood

    to do something in advance

    Structure

    • Verb[ て ] + おく

    View on Bunpro

  • allinlabs

    allinlabs

    Misa from JapaneseAmmo just made a video about ておく. It would be good if you added it to the grammar point

  • mrnoone

    mrnoone

    Hey and welcome on community forums

    I have added it to the “readings” section!

    Cheers,

    PS
    Cool avatar, what does it depict?

  • Pep95

    Pep95

    Would I be able to write ておく as て置く when referring to this grammar point in a sentence? Or should I simply keep writing hiragana when referring to these types of grammar points?

  • mrnoone

    mrnoone

    Hey

    You should keep writing them in hiragana, otherwise, it can cause confusion.

    Cheers,

  • eran

    eran

    来週らいしゅうまでに漢字かんじを30字じ おぼえておかなく てはいけない
    why is the translation " By next week, I have to memorize 30 kanji in advance ."?
    according to this grammer point: https://bunpro.jp/grammar_points/67 it should mean I DON’T have to right?

  • mrnoone

    mrnoone

    Hey

    You have negative て form of おく used here 覚えておかなくてはいけない, which together with はいけない form double negative, meaning must must なくてはいけない grammar point.

    It sounds complicated, but basically なくてはいけない means “must” while てはいけない means “must not”. It is quite a long phrase, so it might be confusing, but you will get used to it.

    Negative て form is really easy to make：
    おく→negative form->おかない-replace い with く→おかなく-add て->おかなくて (done)

    I hope it helps,
    Cheers!

    PS
    てはいけない means “must not”, in other words, something is prohibited, not allowed. It is important to not do that.
    ここで駐車してはいけない。
    You must not park here. Do not park here. Parking here is prohibited.

    While “don’t have to” means there is no ...

  • Ambo100

    Ambo100

    Could とく/どく be added as synonyms or included in the structure as they are casual contractions of ておく? (Perhaps used in examples as well)

    This also would be helpful for people trying to find what とく means when they don’t already know it’s a contraction.

  • mrnoone

    mrnoone

    Thanks!

    I actually thought we had those on the site already

  • siditious

    siditious

    This double negative is really unintuitive, this can’t be common usage.

  • matt_in_mito

    matt_in_mito

    Hi and welcome.
    This double negative is the Japanese way of saying that someone has to do something. There are some different ways of doing it, for example;
    ～ないといけない
    ～なければいけない
    ～なければならない
    but they’re all double negatives and they’re all used all the time in everyday speech. It comes very naturally after a while.

  • kelth

    kelth

    Hello, just to see if i am understanding correctly,
    覚えておか なく てはいけない
    is saying you must not not memorize in advance?

  • matt_in_mito

    matt_in_mito

    No, it’s a double negative so it means you must remember in advance.

  • kelth

    kelth

    That would be how the double negative ultimately ends up in the English version I wrote: “you must not not memorize in advance.”
    I believe the Japanese is saying you are not allowed to not memorize it in advanced, not that you must memorize it in advanced. It ultimately means the same thing, but the logic is not the same.

  • nekoyama

    nekoyama

    This is a fairly normal way to say this though that’s used when one would say “must” in English. So it’s better to think of it as translating to “must” because Japanese speakers do not perceive this as a particularly strange construction in the way a literal translation to English is perceived by speakers of English.

  • siditious

    siditious

    So why not use the more traditional forms
    覚えておかなければいけない
    or 覚えておかなければいません
    both mean the same thing, the expectation of the prompt is very ambiguous as is the translation of the solution.

  • mrnoone

    mrnoone

    Hey

    All the forms are correct and used, so it is good to learn all of them .
    What is more なければいけない is introduced in N4 lesson 8, and ておく appears in lesson 7 so we have used なくてはいけない (from lesson 1) instead, since we are building on previously learned grammar constructions.

    I hope it helps,
    Cheers

  • pasi

    pasi

    Hi, one of the examples has ~おこう. Which grammar point is this from? Is this something I haven’t run into yet because I’ve chosen Tae Kim path?

  • FredKore

    FredKore

    @pasi Check these out:
    Volitional form
    https://www.bunpro.jp/grammar_points/121
    https://www.bunpro.jp/grammar_points/70

  • pasi

    pasi

    Thanks, so it’s casual volitional. I guess my “Kim Tae path diagnosis” was correct.

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