ことなく
- 1Without doing an action, often stressed with 一〜も to mean "not even once."Ex. 1
- 2Without undergoing or experiencing an event that could have been expected to happen.Ex. 2
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A formal, written-style expression common in news reports, essays, speeches and formal narration. It carries the same core idea as ずに or ないで but sounds more literary and more emphatic. It often pairs with 一度も, 1日も or 休む to stress that something never happened over a period of time.
Do not attach ことなく to the ない-form or た-form; use the plain dictionary form (休むことなく, not 休まないことなく).
Do not attach it directly to nouns; for nouns, use なしに or なく instead (休みなく).
Note that it sounds stiff in casual conversation, where ないで or ずに is more natural.
- ことなしにN1「ことなしに(は)」usually pairs with a negative or a rhetorical question in the following clause, stressing that the second action cannot be achieved without doing the first — a usage 「ことなく」generally does not have. When simply meaning 'do B without doing A,' the two are close in sense.
- なしにN2「なしに」attaches to nouns, as in 「休みなしに」, and is neutral in register; in the 'do B without doing A' sense it is close to 「ことなく」. When it expresses a necessary condition, it usually appears as 「なしには」followed by a negative.
- ずにN3「ずに」attaches to the ない-form (as in 「せずに」) and can also mean 'do B without doing A,' even for small everyday matters; 「ことなく」takes the dictionary form, sounds more formal, and stresses that something that could have happened never did. 「ことなく」can usually be replaced by 「ずに」, but not necessarily the other way around.
- ないでN3「ないで」attaches to the ない-form and is neutral in register. In the senses 'without having done...' and 'do B without doing A' it is mostly interchangeable with 「ことなく」, but 「ことなく」is the more formal of the two, so 「ないで」is the better choice in everyday speech; only 「ないで」can be used for a request at the end of a sentence.
- ままN4「まま」describes a state remaining as is; it attaches to the た-form and ない-form of verbs, to adjectives, to noun＋の, and so on, and is neutral in register. 「ことなく」stresses that something was never done or never happened, attaches only to the verb dictionary form, and leans toward written style, so the two are generally not interchangeable.
ことなしに (N1) is even more formal and is often used in the pattern ことなしには〜ない ("without X, Y is impossible"). なしに attaches to nouns rather than verbs, and ずに and ないで are the everyday equivalents of ことなく. まま differs because it describes a state left unchanged ("as is") rather than an action or event that never occurs.
