那本小说的故事我现在还记得很清楚

[rtf]

Hello,everyone!

 

Should I translate 那本小说的故事我现在还记得很清楚  as 'I remember this ... quite well' or 还 has a different function here?

 

 

Thanks a lot.

[somethingfunny]

That novel's story I still remember well.

[Shelley]

I have taken on a different way of translating things lately and I wonder if it might not be of help to you. If you are just trying to understand the sentence and do not have a need to put it into correct English, you might try translating it and preserving the word order.

 

So for me I would translate your sentence as:

 

That volume novel story I now still remember very clearly.

 

You can see how  还 works as still this way.

 

I have found that this helps me understand chinese grammar and sentence construction better. I don't usually translate any further for my own studies but if you need to go one step further I would say it is:

 

I still remember that novel's story very clearly.

[rtf]

Thanks,somethingfunny,thanks,Shelley!

 

I just thought it has something in common with 我身体还好 (my health is quite good) -> ...我还记得清楚 (... I remember quite well).

 

@Shelley: I`ll try and see how it works out for me,thanks!

[somethingfunny]

I'm not a grammar expert but it would appear that as a verb (or adverb) in front of an adjective, it means quite.  Where as, as an adverb in front of a verb it means still.

 

If you wanted to say what you think it meant originally it would be: 我记得还清楚 - where 还 is an adverb modifying the adjective 清楚, so means quite.

 

Just think of some easy examples you know:

 

还好

还行

还可以

还不错

 

as opposed to:

 

我还要

我还去

你还买吗？

[rtf]

Thanks,somethingfunny. It's the devil's work, I don`t know how I could not realize that,it`s definitely from overwork