other N3 common casualpolitewritten

反語 — rhetorical question

反語・はんご

Meaning

rhetorical question — a question asked not to get an answer but to assert its opposite with force

反語はんご is a *device*, not a fixed pattern: a positive-looking question carries a negative meaning, and a negative-looking one a positive meaning. The speaker already knows the answer and uses the question shape for emphasis or indignation.

Key sentence

そんなことが許ゆるせるものか。

How could I ever forgive such a thing? (= I can't.)

Formation

Attaches to	Form	Example
A question framed to imply the opposite — often with ものか, だろうか, 〜ことがあろうか, or a plain 〜か	[question] + (か / ものか / だろうか)	誰だれが信しんじるだろうか / 行いくものか

Examples

今いまさら謝あやまって、何なにになるだろうか。

What good would apologizing now do? (= None.)

こんな簡単かんたんな問題もんだいが分わからないはずがあろうか。

Could there be any way I wouldn't understand such an easy problem? (= Of course not.)

Easily confused with

だろうか A plain だろうか genuinely wonders ('I wonder if ~'); read as 反語 (誰だれが行いくだろうか) it instead asserts the opposite ('no one would go'). Tone and context decide which reading applies.

Notes

ものか / もんか is an explicitly rhetorical ending that always negates (負まけるものか, 'as if I'd lose!'). Recognizing 反語 is mainly a reading skill — taking a question as a forceful statement.

See 反語 in real sentences

Jengo shows 反語 the way you actually meet it: inside real Japanese sentences, so it sticks instead of staying an abstract rule.

Study it in Jengo

Sources Compiled with reference to A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar.

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