Phrasal Verbs

There are many verbs in Japanese formed though a combination of two verbs—the equivalent of phrasal verbs in English, e.g. to take back, to calm down, to keep on doing, etc. In Japanese these “joint verbs” are formed by taking the pre-masu (連用形) stem of one verb and adding another. See here for a reminder of basic verb conjugations.

Verb I	Verb II	Phrasal Verb
取とる	戻もどす	取とり戻もどす
to take	to return	to take back

Verb I	Verb II	Phrasal Verb
切きる	出だす	切きり出だす
to cut	to let out	to cut out

While 切り出す literally means “to cut out” (like quarrying stone or cutting timber), its most common everyday usage is figurative, meaning “to broach a subject” or “to break the ice.” Compound verbs often take on metaphorical meanings

Verb I	Verb II	Phrasal Verb
落おちる	着つく	落おち着つく
to fall	to arrive/stick	to settle/calm down

Verb I	Verb II	Phrasal Verb
受うける	入いれる	受うけ入いれる
to accept	to put in	to come to terms with

The second verb (Verb II) dictates the entire conjugation pattern of the new compound verb. The first verb becomes locked in place and never changes. That means, if Verb II is an Ichidan (ru-verb), the new compound verb acts exactly like an Ichidan verb. If Verb II is a Godan (u-verb), the compound acts like a Godan verb.

It is worth remembering the following verbs because they are very often used as suffixes.

泣なき出だす。

To start crying / To burst into tears.

食たべ続つづける。

To continue eating.

読よみ終おわる。

To finish reading.

やり直なおす。

To do it again / try again.

習ならい始はじめる。

To start learning.

To dive a little deeper into phrasal verbs, it is worth focusing on 始める as an example.

You will always use 〜始はじめる and never use 〜始はじまる as a Verb II. Just like other compound verbs, it conjugates exactly like an Ichidan (ru-verb) because 始はじめる is an Ichidan verb.

Because 始はじめる is transitive (to start something) and 始はじまる is intransitive (something starts), learners logically assume that if Verb I is intransitive, they must switch the suffix to 〜始はじまる. This is incorrect. In standard Japanese, 〜始はじめる acts as a universal suffix for “starting,” regardless of whether the first verb is transitive or intransitive. 〜始はじまる is simply not used as a productive compound verb suffix. In other words, the following is incorrect:

雨あめが降ふり始はじまる。(✖️)

雨あめが降ふり始はじめる。(✔️)

To start to rain.

Here, rain is the subject, and falling (降ふる) is an intransitive verb; however, the suffix remains 〜始はじめる.

Incidentally, 終おわる (to finish) is a bit of a curveball in this respect. If Verb II should always be 始はじめる (to start)—a transitive verb—why is 終おえる (to finish; transitive) not used as the Verb II above.

This is because 終おわる focuses on the fact that an action has come to its natural end or conclusion, whereas 終おえる heavily emphasizes human intention, effort, and the completion of a specific task. Further, you can, grammatically, use both in Japanese.

食たべ終おわる。

I finished eating (expected that you would finish a meal).

食たべ終おえる。

I completed the act of eating (as if “eating” itself were a challenge).

And if, understandly, that logic still doesn’t click, just remember that to start to do something always uses 始はじめる and to finish something uses 終おわる (in 99% of cases).