A serious discussion about the need for more gun control

On Thu, 17 Jan 2008 23:38:27 -0500, with neither quill nor qualm, "Ed Huntress" quickly quoth:

You cannot "bring" something "there". Bring it here, take it there. You're better than that, Ed. If you're not careful, the next thing you know you'll be saying is "there's many", "try and", "gave it to my wife and I", and "tempatchur", fer chrissake.

/anguished engrish teacher

--- Chaos, panic, and disorder--my work here is done.

Pfffht. From the American Heritage Dictionary, which is the most

"When the relevant point of focus is not the place of speaking itself, the difference obviously depends on the context. We can say either The labor leaders brought or took their requests to the mayor's office, depending on whether we want to describe things from the point of view of the labor leaders or the mayor. Perhaps for this reason, the distinction between bring and take has been blurred in some areas; a parent may say of a child, for example, She always takes a pile of books home with her from school. This usage may sound curious to those who are accustomed to observe the distinction more strictly, but it bears no particular stigma of incorrectness or illiteracy."

The usage here is completely arbitrary: it depends upon whether the speaker (me) is at home, taking the snake, or at school, bringing the snake. There is no "here" or "there" in my original sentence.

Here's a quote from Websters: "Merriam-Webster's quotes the 1984 edition of the Longman Dictionary of the English Language, which says, "Either verb can be used when the point of view is irrelevant." The entry continues with an example of a couple who are about to leave home for a concert; the wife says, "Don't forget to bring the umbrella." Merriam-Webster's says that the wife "is already thinking of being at the concert and possibly needing the umbrella. The notion of direction exists entirely in her head; it does not refer to her immediate external surroundings."

This is a typical schoolmarm distinction that doesn't really exist in the language, like splitting infinitives (it's done all the time by the best writers, and always has been) or not ending a sentence with a preposition (it's not English; it's not anything, actually). When we start getting formal, I'll listen. (But I probably won't agree.) However, this is a distinction that, as AHD says, is blurred in real use.

-- Ed Huntress

On Fri, 18 Jan 2008 09:36:34 -0500, with neither quill nor qualm, "Ed Huntress" quickly quoth:

In my world, "to school" is the same as "there". And the parent should have said her daughter "brought them home from school" because she was home, or "here".

She was right. He brought it to her in the car and they left.

Well, schoolmarm Larry thinks it's much less blurred. Pffffht!

-- You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. -- Mark Twain

If the parent said "brought them home *from* school," then brought would be easier to justify. "Home" is the physical point from which the statement is asserted. If, on the other hand, I'm dragging a jar with a snake in it to school, and if you know that I'm both at home and at school at different times but my location at the time of the sentence is unspecified, it's just like the example in Websters: the notion of direction exists in my head, and it doesn't matter to the sentence whether I'm thinking from the point of view of leaving home, or from the point of view of having arrived at school.

But she wasn't yet in the car, so, by your rule, one would *take* it to the car. As the example says, the notion of where she is exists entirely in her head.

The best usage dictionaries in America today disagree with you in this case. d8-)

-- Ed Huntress

On Fri, 18 Jan 2008 21:50:45 -0500, with neither quill nor qualm, "Ed Huntress" quickly quoth:

In any case, you took the snake to school, period. Unless the teacher was telling it, when it would be "He brought a snake to class." The easy fix is to use "take" in all instances except when "to here" is stated or implied. In your cases, it wasn't. Besides, you're telling a tale of old. Our old school days are never considered "here", IMHO. They're "there" and in another "when".

The implication (my inference) is "bring it with us."

Yabbut current usage isn't the same as correct, at least the way I was brought up. Current usage also allows an errant "e" to creep into smoky, hazy, etc. It jes ain't right, Jefro.

We'll have to agree to disagree.

-- You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. -- Mark Twain

I laughed for 5 min after reading that. :-) ...lew...

Larry and Ed . A better comedy team than Homer and Jethro. Or even Laurel and Hardy. Way above any current comedians. :-) ...lew...

Where did you get this stuff? What's your reference for this?

Yeah. You should read it. Here's the telling line: "Officially Correct English, like the Tooth Fairy and Civic Virtue, is a product of grade school mythology and rarely leads to satisfying answers or useful decisions."

If you read it carefully, you'll see that, under all the obfuscation of "causative transitive forms" and so on, it says the same thing that the Webster's usage guide says. And that says, where the "here" and "there" are unspecified, the word to use is the one that expresses what the writer or speaker has in mind.

This whole event occurred in the past, so there is no "here" or "there," unless it's explicit in the sentence. As I wrote it, I was neither here nor there. So, in this case, it was not explicit.

Why would that be different from "bring it with you," which, since they haven't left yet, violates your "rule"?

If you want to see the state of the art, read David Crystal's books. He's probably the foremost historical linguist of English. What you'll see is that most of the rules that give trouble, like the ones we've discussed, are a load of crap cooked up by schoolmarms who had no idea of what they were talking about. They were trying to turn English grammar into something like French or Latin, and they did it at three different periods of history. Those rules have no historical basis in English and they often have no logic, either.

That's spelling. Spelling evolves, and there is no such thing as "correct" spelling, which you'll see if you read 17th and 18th century English in the unedited originals. There is only common spelling. The rules are broken consistently; English spelling is full of exceptions, based on nothing more than common usage.

We can disagree, but it would be more useful if we knew what you were basing your ideas upon. The contemporary usage manuals, of which I've given two major examples, generally take the point of view that I've taken.

-- Ed Huntress

But not paid nearly as well. There's no justice.

-- Ed Huntress

On Sat, 19 Jan 2008 02:04:35 -0500, with neither quill nor qualm, "Ed Huntress" quickly quoth:

Life 101. LRAFB Elementary, Jacksonville JHS, Vista HS.

Damn, I knew you'd catch that. ;)

It doesn't. "Bring" indicates "here". To me, with me. Butcha gotta say it right. "Bring it with you when you come to breakfast with me." is good. "Bring it with you when you when you go to school." isn't.

My base is perfectly o^Hsubjective; up with what I grew. ;)

So, since you disagree, are you saying "for her and I" yet?

-- You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. -- Mark Twain

Objective and nominative mixtures make a part of my brain hurt when I see or hear them. That's how this stuff gets implanted in our heads. Bad grammar juju should cause mild headaches. If it wasn't for that, I couldn't make a living as an editor. I would be too slow.

I got into a hell of an argument with a highly educated writer and our other editor (I was Senior Editor on that job but one never pulls rank in that work) a year ago. It was over comma splices. They raised holy hell with me because I sometimes splice independent clauses with commas -- a trend in good writing today, and it was good enough for Shakespeare. They remind me of you. d8-)

My conclusion is that your point about misuse of "bring" and "take" is not a bad thing, but examples of real writing show, as Webster's demonstrated, that the supposed rule simply doesn't apply in many cases. That's typical of grammar rules in English, and the reason I disparage schoolmarm grammar. To make it teachable and memorable they make it too rigid. Often, as in this case, they stretch points to avoid violating the rule and kids learn to write stilted English for no legitimate reason. I'll guess that your brain has been trained to spot the uses of bring and take and to run the usage through your rule filter automatically. Again, that's not a bad thing. But your rule is too simplistic and you're reaching to make the rule apply. It doesn't.

There is hardly a thing in English for which I think of rules when I'm editing. As I said, it all has to work automatically or you have no chance. Clumsy sentences and bad grammatic constructions have to cause some pain, automatically, when you read them, or you'll never get the job done. You train by a lifetime of reading good writing to keep that part of your brain sharp and aware. As it happens, a lot of good writing violates a lot of the rules. So if you work at editing for a long period, the rules themselves can cause headaches. You recognize quickly when you encounter one that makes no sense.

-- Ed Huntress

On Sat, 19 Jan 2008 10:05:46 -0500, with neither quill nor qualm, "Ed Huntress" quickly quoth:

Why do they remind you of me? I splice all over the place, too.

That simplistic rule works almost every time.

Grok that, but I still disagree, of course.

Ciao!

-- You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. -- Mark Twain

Because they look at rules first, and try to make the writing fit the rules even if it requires a stretch to do so.

But not where the the point of view is indeterminate. And that's often the case.

No, mouse turds is what someone *else* does for a living. This is what I do for a living. And it's not a bad living.

-- Ed Huntress

But ED you aren't getting paid for this so are claiming it on your income tax as a donation to "charity" ? :-) ...lew...

Education expense. d8-)

-- Ed Huntress