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I had the opportunity last week to practice some old grammar points from first year Japanese: comparatives and superlatives. The textbook (Yookoso! 1 GP1 cool is pretty confusing. And although I remember this grammar in theory, putting it into practice is much more difficult.

In both Japanese and English you use different forms when you want to compare two things and when you want to compare three or more things.
Comparative Superlative
attributes bigger, better, more beautiful biggest, best, most beautiful
actions jumps higher, runs faster jumps (the) highest, runs (the) fastest
alternatives Which is better?
=> A or B? A is better. Which is the best? A or B or C?
=> C is the best.
What is the most expensive hotel in Tokyo?
=> Hotel X is the most expensive hotel in Tokyo.
sameness My car is about as old as your car.

Comparing Attributes

Learning how to make comparisons in Japanese reminds me again how glad I am that I'm not studying English. In English when you compare the attributes of two things, English adjectives change form: (big, bigger), (small, smaller), (new, newer). This ～er form is called the comparative form.

Japanese adjectives do not have a comparative form. To compare two things, you use a specific sentence structure which basically means, NP1=Predicate Adjective, compared with NP2.
A: Austin is big. オースティンは　大きい　です。(Osutein wa Ooki Desu.)
B: Austin's not big. オースティンは　大きくない　です。 (Osutein wa Okikunai Desu.)
A: Compared with San Marcos. サンマーコスより。 (Sanmakosu Yori)
B: Compared with San Marcos, Austin is big.
=>　Austin is bigger than San Marcos. サンマーコスより　オースティンは　大きい　です。 (Sanmakosu Yori Osutein wa Okii Desu.)
＝＞　オースティンは　サンマーコスより　大きい　です。 (Ostein wa Sanmakosu Yori Okii desu)

You are not actually saying that Austin is big, just that is is bigger than San Marcos. For example. My husband's car is old. But it's newer than my car. So I'm not saying that my husband's car is new, just that it is more new than my car. That sounds really awkward, right? So with ～er adjectives just think, "newer than", "bigger than", "smaller than".

Many English adjectives don't have an ～er form. You can't say "It's interestinger." You say "It's more interesting". So another English translation of より(Yori) is "more [adjective] than".