The structures introduced here lets us say things like “the cheaper the better” or “the higher you climb the colder it will get”. In fact, it is a combination of two pieces of grammar that we have already learnt: the conditional and ほど.
| 【Verb: 〜ば】【Verb: Dictionary】ほど |
| お酒を飲めば飲むほど酔っ払う。 |
| The more you drink the more drunk you’ll become. |
| 食べれば食べるほど太ってしまう。 |
| The more you eat the fatter you will get. |
| 人がいればいるほど楽しいです。 |
| The more the merrier. |
| 日本語を勉強すればするほど日本語が上手になります。 |
| The more you study Japanese the better your Japanese will become. |
| Note the omission of 勉強 for the second verb. The verb is obvious from the structure and so does not need to be repeated. |
| 決して、お金があればあるほど幸せになるとは言えない。 |
| You cannot definitely say that the more money you have the happier you will be. |
We can also apply the structure to adjectives.
| 【I-Adjective: 〜ば】【I-Adjective】ほど |
| 【Na-Adjective】なら【Na-Adjective】なほど |
| 早ければ早いほどいい。 |
| The faster the better. |
For simple sentences we can also omit the conditional.
| 安いほどいい。 |
| The cheaper the better. |
| 寿司は魚が新鮮なら新鮮なほどおいしい。 |
| For sushi, the fresher the fish the better. |
| 経験が豊かなら豊かなほど様々な問題に対応できる。 |
| The more experience you have the more you’ll be able to deal with all sorts of issues. |