40391
In one of 宮沢賢治's stories, the following sentence appears:

```

    そのとき風がどうと吹いて来て教室のガラス戸はみんながたがた鳴り、
    学校のうしろの山の萱や栗の木はみんな変に青じろくなってゆれ、
    教室のなかのこどもはなんだかにやっとわらってすこしうごいたようでした
    
```

My question is as to what the meaning of 青じろく (青白く) is here.

The technical definition of this word seems to be "bluish white" or "pale",
however in context I don't understand why the trees "paled strangely".

Are the trees "paling" because their leaves are turning over due to the wind?
Or for some other reason?

Or would "darken" be a closer English word to express this usage?
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-10-27T01:40:58.157
40345
2016-10-29T15:22:16.373
2016-10-27T01:51:26.570
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question
definitions
Meaning of 青じろい in 風の又三郎
It seems to me like a rhetorical figure more than anything. I can't say
anything for a certainty, but 「青白い」 calls to my mind such ideas as "ghastly",
"spooky", "eerie", so it could be alluding to the (suspected) true identity of
高田三郎 the new transfer kid, which is, as Wikipedia puts it,
「地元で伝説となっている風の神様の子。神というよりも悪霊に近い存在。」

(I haven't read the novel, by the way. So the entirety of my knowledge of the
story consists almost wholly of the quote and what's written on the Wikipedia
article. Yay!)
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-10-27T17:43:44.600
40391
2016-10-28T04:47:29.407
2016-10-28T04:47:29.407
11575
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answer
Miyazawa is not above strange descriptions. But here, it sounds like he's
describing the apparent change in the color of leaves caused by the wind
blowing and seeing the underside of the leaves. And, while the dictionary
translates 青じろく as "bluish white", keep in mind that あお has a wide range of
meaning covering "pale", "green", and "blue". I might translate it as
"strangely turning a pale green as they rustled"
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-10-29T15:22:16.373
40486
2016-10-29T15:22:16.373
4875
40345
answer