Hi all!

So I'm working through kore (4343/5928) and I've had some trouble with what I've been calling "compound verbs". Things like 引っ張る,引き受ける,受け入れる,...

How do you guys go about remembering these? If I can derive the meaning of the compound from the parts then that helps, but often I don't see any connection. Otherwise I memorize it without using the parts of the compound.

-Jesse

Yes, compound verb meanings are often related only vaguely or not at all to the meanings of their component verbs; usually I think it's best just to treat it as a verb of its own.

The Handbook of Japanese Compound Verbs has entries for 200 compound verbs including examples for each. The preface/introduction section has a discussion on the various ways that two verbs can combine semantically to give a compound verb's meaning. I'm not sure it's actually all that much more useful than just finding a decent dictionary entry, but OTOH $0.63+shipping isn't very much if you like collecting books on Japanese :-)