に忍びないcan't bear to
Your heart won't let you: you can't bear to throw it away, to turn someone down, to watch. What stops you is pity or attachment. It is literary, and goes with a small set of verbs.
I couldn't bring myself to throw away the doll I had treasured for years just because it had got old.
The sight of the injured dog in pain is more than I can bear to watch.
How to form it
Verb dictionary form + に忍びない (a small set of verbs)
Mostly 捨てる, 手放す, 断る, 見捨てる, and 見る, 聞く. Past: 忍びなかった. Today people also say 〜のは忍びない.
- What stops you
- Pity for someone, or attachment to something. Nothing outside you is in the way.
- Said about
- Your own feeling, or that of the person a story is following.
- Where you'll meet it
- Novels, essays, letters, formal speech: mostly one to recognize. In conversation people say かわいそうで見ていられない or もったいなくて捨てられない.
In use
The cherry tree is failing, but my grandfather planted it, and I can't bear to cut it down.
He has only just lost his mother, and I can't bring myself to refuse what he asks.
A small child crying for help is unbearable to hear.
It still worked and I couldn't bear to throw it away, so I gave it to a friend.
のは忍びない: the shape heard today.
Not for what you just dislike
English "can't bear to" also covers things you hate doing. 忍びない doesn't: there has to be someone or something you feel for.
Not said: 寒い朝は、
(On cold mornings I can't bear to get out of bed.)
出たくない, or 出るのがつらい.
Close neighbours
に堪えないN1
見るに堪えない, 聞くに堪えない: too awful to watch or hear. It judges the thing (cruel, ugly, badly made), and there need be no pity in it.
During the match, heckling too ugly to listen to came flying from the stands.
がたいN2
Also the heart holding back, but as a verdict on the thing: 許しがたい, "unforgivable"; 捨てがたい, "too good to give up".
Both designs are too good to give up.
Check yourself
1Which one fits?
亡くなった
Choose an answer to see why.
2What did the writer feel?
親とは
Choose an answer to see why.
More detail
忍ぶ is "to bear", so 忍びない is "can't bear". In novels it also ends in 忍びず, before what was done instead.
Unable to bring myself to abandon the rain-soaked puppy, I took it home.
More sentences
My sister sat up all night nursing, and has finally fallen asleep. I can't bring myself to wake her.
Knowing how many years of effort he had put in, I couldn't bring myself to turn the offer down.