Different languages have different constructions when it comes to expressing needs. I'll divide this post between nominative languages and dative languages. The former have a subject expressed in your usual nominative, as is the case in English; the latter puts the subject in the dative case and the object needed in the nominative case:
Nominative languages:
English: I need a pen.
Portuguese: Preciso/Necessito de uma caneta.
Spanish: Necesito un bolígrafo.
Czech: Potřebuji pero.
Polish: Potrzebuję pióra.
Note: Portuguese precisar and necessitar are normally followed by the preposition de. Omission of the preposition is a sign of an older style of language, especially with precisar.
Polish potrzebować requires the genitive: pióro (nom.) - pióra (gen.). German bedürfen has a similar construction, in which the object is also placed in the genitive: Ich bedarf eines Kugelschreibers.
Dative languages:
Romanian: Îmi trebuie un stilou.
Latin: Mihi opus est calamus.
Russian: Мне нужна ручка.
French: Il me faut un stylo.
Macedonian: Ми треба перо.
Note: In Russian the adjective нужeн has to agree with the thing needed in gender and number.
Japanese resorts to "sentential predicate" (I am not sure if this is an accepted terminology) in order to express needs and wants.
ReplyDelete私はペンが必要だ／いる。
watashi-wa pen-ga hitsuyōda/iru.
I-TOPIC pen-GA be-necessary/need.
Note here that hitsuyōda is an adjective and iru is a verb. Both words express a state of necessity.
Postposition -ga is used to mark the modified noun as the experiencer of the state denoted by the verb or the adjective.
The combination of a noun and an inflected word constitutes a sentence. This sentence is, then, indicated as the predicate of watashi by virtue of the topicalising -wa.
In many languages needs are considered to be an enduring phenomenon. If someone finds herself in need of something, the needed object cannot become unnecessary next moment without a good reason. Being needed, therefore, is a state for the object being needed. The Japanese construction with -ga. capitalises on this thought pattern.