41440
In one of the Japanese learning books I own there is a following text (right
from the start):

バーシカの生活は酷いもんだった。親兄弟もいなければこれと言った仕事もなく、夜は古ぼけた納屋の下で眠り、暇な時は蚤取りをして過ごした。

バーシカ is the name of the dog. The approximate translation, as I understand it,
is: "Baska's life was terrible. He didn't have any family, didn't have any
job, he slept under an old barn at nights, and spent his free time catching
fleas."

What I'm interested in is the usage of いなければ there. Clearly, it is supposed to
convey the meaning of "(any family he) didn't have, and...", which is "いなくて"
in Japanese. But in the text there is いなければ, which should be translated as "if
he didn't (have any family)...", and that doesn't make any sense, looking at
the whole sentence.

Now, the original of this text was in Russian, and the author of the book is
Russian too, but this text was translated to Japanese by a Japanese person,
which adds to the doubt that it is simply a mistake. Also, in the grammar
comments for this text the book clearly states: "Inakereba - verb inai in
conditional form (if there is no...)"

So, the question is, can conditional ば form be used in the meaning of くて form,
like in this example? Or maybe I completely missing something, in which case I
would be really thankful for any explanations.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-12-03T20:37:49.427
41438
2016-12-03T22:53:04.213
18934
question
grammar meaning conditionals
can いなければ actually mean いなくて?
There is no mistake in the phrase; It is perfect in every way.

> 「親兄弟{おやきょうだい} **も** い **なければ** これと言{い}った仕事{しごと} **もなく** 、～～～」

Notice this is in the pattern of:

> 「A もなければ B もない」 meaning " _ **neither A nor B**_ "
>
> "(the dog) had _**neither**_ any family of his own _**nor**_ any job worth
> mentioning"

In other words, 「なければ」 is _**not**_ used as "conditional" here in the first
place. It should be taken as just a part of a set phrase.

Finally, if you replaced the 「いなければ」 by 「いなくて」 in this sentence, it would
sound very childish even though it would still be understood.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-12-03T22:53:04.213
41440
2016-12-03T22:53:04.213
2020-06-17T08:18:27.500
-1
41438
answer