Subj : Tenses...  1.
To   : Anton Shepelev
From : Ardith Hinton
Date : Tue Jun 02 2020 22:52:43

Hi, Anton!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

AS>  I should fear to hear it -- what if the inheritance
AS>  turns out to have another magickal item?

AH>  Nah.  Just a few ordinary household items made of xxx,
AH>  yyy, and zzz... none with magic(k)al powers, but all
AH>  of which we are still using.  :-)

AS>  Then I won't pursue this quotidian matter any futher.
AS>  But may I make so bold as to question the grammar in
AS>  the quoted sentence?


          Of course.  You may be sure that whatever I say in the E_T echo has been edited & proofread thoroughly; however, I do miss things sometimes.  :-)



AS>  1. Is it correct to use "but.. which" without a prior
AS>  occurence of "which" in the sentence?


           If I hadn't thought so, I wouldn't have done it.  Perhaps it is an error... or perhaps it's one of those stunts one shouldn't try at home.  :-))

           I could have written "... none of which has [blah blah] but all of which we are still using."  Although it would have made a nicer parallelism I felt it might be unnecessarily wordy.

           IIRC I've seen a few constructions like "... most, but by no means all, of which [i.e. covid-related deaths in this country] are associated with long term care facilities".  In such cases the logic is more obvious....  :-)



AS>  2. Is it correct to express the continued use of these
AS>  items in the present progressive tense?


           As a native speaker I depend heavily on my Russian modem buddies & foreign language textbooks to identify the names of verb tenses.  It seems to me, however, that this tense is appropriate in situations where the action is ongoing.  I could have typed, in a separate sentence, "None of them has [blah blah]... but all of them are still in use."  IMHO the original sounds better.



AS>  This distinction causes me serious doubts in my own
AS>  writing, but in your case I should without
AS>  vaccilation say: "and we still use all of them."


           In general the present tense would work too, but in this example I figure it would change the emphasis as well as the rhythm I had in mind.  :-)



>>>  In a moment, his wife looked up at him and said, "I'm
>>>  sorry. I'd not thought she was capable of a thing like
>>>  that."

AS>  Mark the last sentece, which, again, is uttered by an
AS>  apparently educted person.


           It strikes me as unusual, but not incorrect.  If the person you're referring to lives in the Southern States I'd cut her a bit of slack....  :-)



AS>  How about this:

AS>  a. I forgot he was vegetarian. (he still is)


           That's what I'd probably say.



AS>  b. I forgot he had been vegetarian. (he has reverted)


           If I knew he'd reverted but my brain slipped a cog, I might say "I forgot he'd been vegetarian as an impecunious student but modified his stance after he began doing hard physical work in the construction industry....  :-)




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+
 * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)

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