I have heard that, in former times, there was a very polite form of speaking
in the form of, e.g., "the emperor liked playing to die" instead of "the
emperor died". Is this true that there is a style of japanese in which people
speak about playing to or pretending to do something for reasons of
politeness?
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2011-12-16T21:21:49.753
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2012-02-12T09:08:30.547
2012-02-12T09:08:30.547
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question
keigo
Is there a keigo expression which can be translated as playing or pretending to do?
It is true that a word that means 'play' is used to get the super honorific
form (although you seem to have misunderstanding in that you presented `the
emperor liked playing to die`, which does not fit).

To get the super honorific form, you can attach `あそばす` (which is a classical
honorific form of the verb `遊ぶ` that means 'play' when used as a main verb)
after the verb stem (with epenthetic vowel `i`):

> 亡くなる  
>  'die/disappear' (euphemism of `死ぬ` 'die')
>
> 亡くなられる/お亡くなりになる  
>  'die' (honorific)
>
> お亡くなりあそばす  
>  'die' (super honorific)

or after `お/御+noun`

> 勉強する  
>  'study'
>
> 勉強される/お勉強なさる  
>  'study' (honorific)
>
> お勉強あそばす  
>  'study' (super honorific)

Generally, the strategy primarily used to honor someone in the Japanese
language is to remove the volition from the person. Hence, referring to a
person not by the personal pronouns `彼` or `彼女` but by the locational
demonstratives `こなた` (obsolete), `そなた` (obsolete), `あなた`, `どなた`, or
directional demonstratives `こちら`, `そちら`, `あちら`, `どちら`, as if that person is
not a person, is more polite. `られ`, which initially only meant passive, came
to be used to express honorifics because passive will syntactically remove the
volitionality (agenthood) from the subject. The same with `なる` 'become'.
Becoming something does not need volition. Using `あそばす` 'play', in my hunch,
is along the same line. By adding this verb, it means that the act was not
done under full serious volition or intention. In English, the same strategy
is used to at least weaken the responsibility of the person doing something
(although I am not sure if that is necessarily considered as being polite).
For example, instead of saying `The US army killed some civilians`, `Some
civilians were killed (by the US army)` implies less volition, hence less
responsibility, of the subject.

In present Japanese, this form is used as 役割語 (stereotypical role words) for
rich madams (often in imperative form). These are called あそばせ言葉.

> ごめんあそばせ  
>  'excuse me' (implication of stereotypical rich madam)
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2011-12-16T23:41:13.743
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2012-01-02T02:52:24.860
2012-01-02T02:52:24.860
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answer