Correct translation


I am having trouble translating the following sentence:

> スーザンは一人で淋しがっています。

I can't determine whether it means:

  1. Susan feels lonely by herself.
  2. Only Susan is feeling lonely.
  3. Susan seems lonely by herself.

From my understanding of ~がっています is that it means "shows signs of~"

So the sentence in my mind should mean "Susan seems lonely by herself."




Let's go by exclusion.

We can pretty much exclude 2.: it implies a comparison among other people, and
there is nothing here that seems to suggest that (だけ、しか。。ない, etc). Unless,
maybe I should add, in this case the は is used as contrast particle, which
implies that the speaker "knows" that she feels lonely by herself (but others
don't).

Number 1 and 3 are pretty similar in English, and could both work in this
case. 淋しがる is an intransitive verb meaning "to miss someone / to feel lonely".

The -がる construction with いーadjectives turns the word from an adjective to a
verb meaning feeling like or looking like (as you say) that adjective. In this
case, it just means "feeling lonely". For more about -garu, see
[here](https://selftaughtjapanese.com/2014/04/21/japanese-
suffix-%E3%83%BC%E3%81%8C%E3%82%8B-garu/) for example. There is actually also
an example very similar to yours.

So to recap, _Susan feels lonely by herself_ , seems the most appropriate
translation to me.

However, I would like to point out also another option.

Do you know that two sentences can be connected by the "pre-masu" form of a
verb? See [this
question](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/48667/why-this-verb-
isnt-in-the-dictionary-form/48671#48671) for example. Well it works in the
same way with です --＞ で.

Hence, in this case, the sentence:

> スーザンは一人で淋しがっています。

could also be:

_Susan is alone and (because of that) she feels lonely._

**PS**. I also asked a native speaker about this sentence and she said it
could be both, either 1. or my last example.




Let's go by exclusion.

We can pretty much exclude 2.: it implies a comparison among other people, and
there is nothing here that seems to suggest that (だけ、しか。。ない, etc). Unless,
maybe I should add, in this case the は is used as contrast particle, which
implies that the speaker "knows" that she feels lonely by herself (but others
don't).

Number 1 and 3 are pretty similar in English, and could both work in this
case. 淋しがる is an intransitive verb meaning "to miss someone / to feel lonely".

The -がる construction with いーadjectives turns the word from an adjective to a
verb meaning feeling like or looking like (as you say) that adjective. In this
case, it just means "feeling lonely". For more about -garu, see
[here](https://selftaughtjapanese.com/2014/04/21/japanese-
suffix-%E3%83%BC%E3%81%8C%E3%82%8B-garu/) for example. There is actually also
an example very similar to yours.

So to recap, _Susan feels lonely by herself_ , seems the most appropriate
translation to me.

However, I would like to point out also another option.

Do you know that two sentences can be connected by the "pre-masu" form of a
verb? See [this
question](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/48667/why-this-verb-
isnt-in-the-dictionary-form/48671#48671) for example. Well it works in the
same way with です --＞ で.

Hence, in this case, the sentence:

> スーザンは一人で淋しがっています。

could also be:

_Susan is alone and (because of that) she feels lonely._

**PS**. I also asked a native speaker about this sentence and she said it
could be both, either 1. or my last example.

