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Brian {Hamilton Kelly}
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2004 10:47 pm
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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On Saturday, in article <4d2294fe8edavid@dacha.freeuk.com>
david@dacha.freeuk.com "David" wrote:
| Quote: | In article <20041223.2357.58890snz@dsl.co.uk>, Brian {Hamilton Kelly}
bhk@dsl.co.uk> wrote:
As others have said, yes. Although only the lazy[1] would use the
verb "got" at all; proper English would expect "We've received a
lot[2] of letters today".
[2] Some purists might claim to eschew "a lot";
however, "a great many" sounds more stilted (far more stilted than
"received" instead of "got").
Surely "a great lot" maps to "many" rather than "a great many".
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Who said ANYTHING about "a great lot"? Certainly not myself; it's a
ridiculous juxtaposition of words (except, perhaps, in the context of an
auction house).
| Quote: | Anyway, no true Englishman would ever say "a great lot"; he might say
"rather a lot".
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Quite; I was offering up "a lot" [N.B. *no* "great" therein] as a more
likely alternative to the OP's "a great many", particularly in speech.
--
Brian {Hamilton Kelly} bhk@dsl.co.uk
"Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n'ai pas eu
le loisir de la faire plus courte."
Blaise Pascal, /Lettres Provinciales/, 1657
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Brian {Hamilton Kelly}
Guest
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| Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2004 10:50 pm
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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On Monday, in article
<1p5ojhkf3gg5s$.1rp5g9eh6z7j4.dlg@40tude.net>
fam.balducciNOSPAM@tin.it "FB" wrote:
| Quote: | On Thu, 23 Dec 2004 23:57:51 +0000 (GMT), Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
[...]
As others have said, yes. Although only the lazy[1] would use the verb
"got" at all; proper English would expect "We've received a lot[2] of
letters today".
[...]
"We've had lots of/many letters today"? Is it better than "we've got"?
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Yes. (But "received" would be better.)
--
Brian {Hamilton Kelly} bhk@dsl.co.uk
"Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n'ai pas eu
le loisir de la faire plus courte."
Blaise Pascal, /Lettres Provinciales/, 1657 |
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Guest
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| Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2004 2:48 am
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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LOL, you're right, that's what I meant.
How many hairs grow on a dog's tail? Alot.
Ivan
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Tony Mountifield
Guest
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| Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2004 10:11 am
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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In article <20041228.2042.58913snz@dsl.co.uk>,
Brian {Hamilton Kelly} <bhk@dsl.co.uk> wrote:
| Quote: | Similarly, there's a prejudice against "nice";
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I was taught a little mantra in infant school in the early 60s, which
has always stuck with me (as of course they are intended to):
"I mustn't use 'very' or 'nice' or the same word twice."
Not sure why 'very' was frowned upon.
Cheers
Tony
--
Tony Mountifield
Work: tony@softins.co.uk - http://www.softins.co.uk
Play: tony@mountifield.org - http://tony.mountifield.org |
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David
Guest
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| Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2004 11:51 am
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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In article <20041228.2047.58914snz@dsl.co.uk>, Brian {Hamilton Kelly}
<bhk@dsl.co.uk> wrote:
| Quote: | On Saturday, in article <4d2294fe8edavid@dacha.freeuk.com
david@dacha.freeuk.com "David" wrote:
In article <20041223.2357.58890snz@dsl.co.uk>, Brian {Hamilton
Kelly} <bhk@dsl.co.uk> wrote:
As others have said, yes. Although only the lazy[1] would use
the verb "got" at all; proper English would expect "We've
received a lot[2] of letters today".
[2] Some purists might claim to eschew "a lot"; however, "a great
many" sounds more stilted (far more stilted than "received"
instead of "got").
Surely "a great lot" maps to "many" rather than "a great many".
Who said ANYTHING about "a great lot"? Certainly not myself; it's a
ridiculous juxtaposition of words (except, perhaps, in the context of
an auction house).
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How very, very [x] true. Possibly you could put it down to the
consumption of a great lot of Special Reserve playing havoc with the
visual cortex; or maybe I was attempting to present simply a far more
convoluted and complex point, which I can't now be bothered to expand.
| Quote: | Anyway, no true Englishman would ever say "a great lot"; he might
say "rather a lot".
Quite; I was offering up "a lot" [N.B. *no* "great" therein] as a
more likely alternative to the OP's "a great many", particularly in
speech.
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Probably, but it does also depend on what you're wanting to emphasise;
a nice point.
[x] Hi Tony! [Waves]
--
http://www.dacha.freeuk.com/joachim/14-0.htm
"Note that one night too, the three blutwursts for Lohengrin's
five very sick swans even got ate by nine. That's ten incidents!" |
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John Hall
Guest
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| Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2004 5:06 pm
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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In article <20041228.2042.58913snz@dsl.co.uk>,
Brian {Hamilton Kelly} <bhk@dsl.co.uk> writes:
| Quote: | Similarly, there's a prejudice against "nice"; although most of the
historical reason therefore has been forgotten. (Try listening to "The
Prime of Miss Jean Brodie".)
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The "modern" usage of "nice" to mean "pleasant" goes back a lot further
than most people might expect. A character in Jane Austen's "Northanger
Abbey" complains about it. Over 150 years later, my English teacher was
making the identical complaint.
--
John Hall
"I am not young enough to know everything."
Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) |
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Guest
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| Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2005 8:15 am
Post subject: Re: Gotten |
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Brian {Hamilton Kelly} wrote:
| Quote: | On 27 Dec, in article
1104187211.103949.288760@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com
vorotyntsev@yahoo.com wrote:
I really don't understand this prejudice against "got." It's a
perfectly good word.
That's because (guessing, and based purely upon your posting mailbox)
you're not a native speaker of proper English. "Got" is one of the
words
that well-educated speakers of British English eschew because it's,
in
the terminology of programmers, "overloaded". Somebody with a
vocabulary
of more than the few thousand words of "Basic English" ought readily
to
find a more apposite replacement for "got" in any particular context.
Similarly, there's a prejudice against "nice"; although most of the
historical reason therefore has been forgotten. (Try listening to
"The
Prime of Miss Jean Brodie".)
--
Brian {Hamilton Kelly}
bhk@dsl.co.uk
"Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n'ai pas
eu
le loisir de la faire plus courte."
Blaise Pascal, /Lettres Provinciales/,
1657 |
Oh, I get it. Why use a two-bit word when you can use a five-dollar
one?
What does "overloaded" mean? Used too much? Too many meanings?
Ivan |
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