Re: Topic-comment sentences in Mandarin

On Mon, 22 Jan 2001, J Matthew Pearson wrote:

> "SMITH,MARCUS ANTHONY" wrote:
>
> > These are referred to as "free topics" and are found in a wide variety of
> > languages, including Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Gunwinjguan languages (in
> > Australia).
> >
> > Japanese first:
> >
> > Yama ga ki ga kirei desu.
> > mountain NOM tree NOM pretty be.
> > 'As for the mountains, the trees are pretty.'
>
> Shouldn't that be "Yama wa ki ga kirei desu"?
No, that would mean something different, though I'm not sure what the
exact difference is.

I asked a fellow student who is a native speaker about such sentences. She
said the one above was okay, but a better example would be:

Haru ga ki ga kirei desu.
spring NOM tree NOM pretty be.
"As for the spring, the trees are pretty."

Marcus