tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4167585665865020265.post7320089622614260354..comments2024-03-29T03:45:15.415+01:00Comments on Random Idea English: On (mis)identifying the passive and passive warsWarsaw Willhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15373568589613033674noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4167585665865020265.post-27302406588073468162015-01-30T14:53:45.684+01:002015-01-30T14:53:45.684+01:00Americans actually use subjunctive more than the B...Americans actually use subjunctive more than the British, where present subjunctive has all but disappeared, except in very formal language. Where an American will say 'It is important that he be at the meeting', Brits prefer 'that he should be at the meeting', or simply 'that he is at the meeting'. And we don't like past subjunctive much either: it's now common to hear 'If I was' rather than 'If I were', which is increasingly seen as rather formal. Like Somerset Maugham, I won't mourn its loss.Warsaw Willhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15373568589613033674noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4167585665865020265.post-35183132338378344882015-01-26T18:24:00.723+01:002015-01-26T18:24:00.723+01:00It is essentially French in origin, fine if correc...It is essentially French in origin, fine if correctly used. But many use it incorrectly.<br /><br />"A body" is an independent analogue of many of its proper usages, as "A body almost dare not get up in the mornings".<br /><br />The Yanks have almost lost the subjunctive by the way--most of them cannot even identify it, let alone use it. Another casualty partly produced by lack of Latin, or even a little French.<br /><br />Again first class article--thanks.Eugene Costahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15649417453647803409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4167585665865020265.post-80054089808471745712015-01-26T17:57:46.098+01:002015-01-26T17:57:46.098+01:00Thanks, Eugene. Glad you liked the post.
I think...Thanks, Eugene. Glad you liked the post. <br /><br />I think one reason that a lot of us Brits try and avoid 'one' is its use as a 1st person pronoun by the monarchy and the aristocracy - 'Describe your typical morning for us, your Grace' 'Well, one gets up at eight, one's butler brings one's breakfast to one's breakfast room, then one walks round one's garden' etc.<br /><br />Then there's the embracing-the-reader 1st person plural 'one' used by Lynne Truss:<br /><br />'One almost dare not get up in the mornings', 'Everwhere one looks', 'Part of one's despair' - all from the first couple of pages.<br /><br />Academics use 'one' as a more formal 'you', and I can live with that, although I still avoid it where possible.<br /><br />Warsaw Willhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15373568589613033674noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4167585665865020265.post-46281846964060418752015-01-24T04:25:42.907+01:002015-01-24T04:25:42.907+01:00Having had more years of Latin than one cares to r...Having had more years of Latin than one cares to remember, one (pardon what Fowler calls the "false first person") despised Strunk and White, which was handed out as biblical in a freshman writing course at Harvard no less, where they really should have known better. Now the same asinine bible is enshrined in Windows' style checker. Surely a topic worthy of Stanislas Lem. Fowler, though authoritarian, is majestic by comparison, as another fellow has noted. Alas, he too had his Latin. Excellent article by the way.<br /><br />E. A. CostaEugene Costahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15649417453647803409noreply@blogger.com