Page 234 - Basic Japanese

Chichi wa depāto no chika ga suki na n desu.

My father loves the basement of a department
store.

5.7. Verb + でしょう deshō

Many people go a step further and drop the no completely

from the expressions discussed above: Doko e iku desu ka?
‘Where’s he going?,’ Otearai ni itta desu ‘He went to the men’s
room.’ As a general thing, this usage is frowned upon by

speakers of Standard Japanese and should perhaps be
avoided by the student. However, certain forms that have

become a part of Standard Japanese originated in this
dropping of the no: the polite forms of the adjective atarashii

desu, ii desu came from the forms atarashii no desu, ii no desu.
Some older Japanese still consider it poor style to say

atarashii desu, ii desu, preferring at least atarashii n desu, ii n desu

—but most people use the forms without even the n
constantly, so that they are now a part of Standard
Japanese. This helps explain the existence of two polite

forms for the perfect adjective at one point: ii deshita and
yokatta desu. They come from the expressions ii no deshita ‘it

was a fact that it is good’ and yokatta no desu ‘it is a fact that

it was good.’ The latter type of phrase, yokatta desu, is the
currently accepted form.

In a similar way, expressions consisting of imperfect or
perfect adjectives plus no deshō ‘will probably be the fact

that…; must be…’ created the now Standard forms ii deshō

‘it must be good’ (compare Tanaka-san deshō ‘It must be Mr.
Tanaka’) and yokatta deshō ‘it must have been good’