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Discussion Groups / English Usage / November 2009When reading a quote, I doubt that changed sentences have different meanings or ungrammartical structures.
A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness, ambition to preserve it." B. "I became possessed with a great desire to show people something of this wonderful loveliness, an ambition to become, in some measure, its preserver.” ----------------------------------------------------------------------- B sentence is the original quote, and A is an altered one for students' level of English. I am non-native English speaker, so, when I read A sentence, I got confused especially by 'ambition to preserve it'. It gave me an idea that it looked like an objective phrase for 'to show' as loveliness. What I understood A sentence was 'He has a great desire to show loveliness and ambition'. But after finding out the original B sentence, I changed my mind, in short I understood: He has a desire and an ambition. Am I correct? Or are there any problem in A or B sentence? At least if there is a conjunction word 'and' before (an) ambition, it could be much more helpful to understand the sentence. It will be appreciated if any one can give me an advice or tip for it. In our last episode, <31ee403a-59e2-4276-b961-f6ba91051421@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com>, the lovely and talented man is hope broadcast on alt.usage.english: > A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful > loveliness, ambition to preserve it." This means: "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness and (with) ambition to preserve it." Another possible interpretation is that the writer sees the desire and the ambition as the same thing. > B. "I became possessed with a great desire to show people something of > this wonderful loveliness, an ambition to become, in some measure, its [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] > the original B sentence, I changed my mind, in short I understood: He > has a desire and an ambition. > Am I correct? Yes. > Or are there any problem in A or B sentence? B is a much weaker expression. Both "something of" and "in some measure" indicate the writer has reservations or is reluctant to commit to a positive statement. > At least if there is a conjunction word 'and' before (an) ambition, it > could be much more helpful to understand the sentence. It will be > appreciated if any one can give me an advice or tip for it. Besides being weaker, B does not resolve the problem of the original sentence.  SignatureLars Eighner <http://larseighner.com/> September 5933, 1993 312 days since Rick Warren prayed over Bush's third term. Obama: No hope, no change, more of the same. Yes, he can, but no, he won't. > B is a much weaker expression. Both "something of" and "in some measure" > indicate the writer has reservations or is reluctant to commit to a positive > statement. And yet I read it differently. I took it that the use of both "something of" and "in some measure" served to highlight magnificent vastness of the "wonderful loveliness". The vastness is conveyed through the suggestion that a visitor could only only experience "something" of it rather than all and that "some measure" underlines a sense of realism that one person's preservation efforts would be but a drop in the ocean, as it were. (I'll assume I'm using "but" there as I intended) Therefore, because an element of humility is also been expressed, B expresses more than the sum of it's words. On Nov 29, 5:40 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote: > > B is a much weaker expression. Both "something of" and "in some measure" > > indicate the writer has reservations or is reluctant to commit to a positive [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] > efforts would be but a drop in the ocean, as it were. (I'll assume I'm > using "but" there as I intended) ... The source of the quotation is Wilson A. Bentley of Vermont, and the subject is snowflakes, which he was the first to photograph. I agree that "something of" and "in some measure" strengthen the statement rather than weakening it. It's impossible to show all of that wonderful loveliness or to preserve any of it completely. By the way, "man is hope", in your subject line I think you wanted "think" or "suspect" rather than "doubt". If you doubt something, you believe that it's untrue or that it may be untrue. (I've read that some people in Scotland and Northern Ireland use "doubt" the way you did, though. Posters from there would be able to advise you about its usage there.) -- Jerry Friedman > A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful > loveliness, ambition to preserve it." [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > B sentence is the original quote, and A is an altered one for > students' level of English. Sentence A has apparently been written by a confused learner of English. I'm not surprised that you were confused by it. It's badly written. The best way to improve it would be to delete the last four words. The second-best way would be to change them to "and an ambition to preserve it". Sentence B would be slightly easier to understand with a semicolon after "loveliness" or perhaps with an "and" before "an ambition". Nevertheless, it is a well-written sentence as it stands. Those of us whose native language is English would understand the implied "and" without having to have it explicitly included. SignaturePeter Moylan, Newcastle, NSW, Australia. http://www.pmoylan.org For an e-mail address, see my web page. We were asked about: >> A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful >> loveliness, ambition to preserve it." >> >> B. "I became possessed with a great desire to show people something >> of this wonderful loveliness, an ambition to become, in some measure, >> its preserver." > Sentence A has apparently been written by a confused learner of English. > I'm not surprised that you were confused by it. It's badly written. The > best way to improve it would be to delete the last four words. But then it would fail to be a correct "translation" of sentence B. > The second-best way would be to change them to "and an ambition to > preserve it". That was my original reaction too, but I think it subtly changes the sense. > Sentence B would be slightly easier to understand with a semicolon after > "loveliness" or perhaps with an "and" before "an ambition". > Nevertheless, it is a well-written sentence as it stands. Those of us > whose native language is English would understand the implied "and" > without having to have it explicitly included. I don't think "and" is the intent. I think Lars Eighner had it right when he said that the writer sees the desire and the ambition as the same thing. In other words, the speaker is saying that the way to "preserve the loveliness" is to show it to other people *so that it will exist in their memories*. My suggested "translation for learners" would make the point explicitly instead of requiring the reader to figure it out: "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness, to preserve it in their memories." Note incidentally that this wording is grammatically ambiguous -- "to preserve" can either be a second way of describing the desire or else it can mean "in order to preserve" -- but it doesn't matter since the overall sense is the same. SignatureMark Brader | "I couldn't imagine what Americans did at night Toronto | when they weren't writing novels." msb@vex.net | --Joseph Heller My text in this article is in the public domain. > A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful > loveliness, ambition to preserve it." [quoted text clipped - 16 lines] > more helpful to understand the sentence. It will be appreciated if any > one can give me an advice or tip for it. Sentence A is an ill-considered use of elision. It is ill-considered because the prime rule is that the vast majority of readers (or listeners) must be expected to infallibly supply the elided material. In this case, the intended sentence, with the elisions supplied, is: "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness, [became filled with a great] ambition to preserve it." That is not to say that normal use is to supply the full, unelided sentence: elision is one of the great natural tools of English. But a better use of it would have resulted in: "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness, a great ambition to preserve it." How much the great majority of listeners can be expected to "infallibly" supply is, of course, a judgement call. But I don't think A meets the criterion. SignatureCordially, Eric Walker, Owlcroft House http://owlcroft.com/english/ > A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful > loveliness, ambition to preserve it." Because its poor construction makes one want to correct it, this could easily be 'corrected' as really meaning; 'I became filled with a great desire to show people an ambition to preserve this wonderful loveliness.' > B. "I became possessed with a great desire to show people something of > this wonderful loveliness, an ambition to become, in some measure, its > preserver.” Whereas, in this, the ambition bit is clearly a secondary matter. > A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful > loveliness, ambition to preserve it." [quoted text clipped - 11 lines] > the original B sentence, I changed my mind, in short I understood: He > has a desire and an ambition. The basic mechanism of version A is the comma splice. Use of the comma in this way provides a shorter (and stronger) way of writing: "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness and filled with an ambition to preserve it." Version A is not a specially admirable sentence but is better than version B (wordy and attenuated.) SignatureDon Phillipson Carlsbad Springs (Ottawa, Canada) [...] > The basic mechanism of version A is the comma splice. Use of the comma > in this way provides a shorter (and stronger) way of writing: "I became > filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful loveliness and > filled with an ambition to preserve it." Is not a "comma splice" the ungrammatical joining of clauses needing a comma+conjunction by a mere comma? If so, A does not fit. > Version A is not a specially admirable sentence but is better than > version B (wordy and attenuated.) I submit that that is entirely subjective, as is "wordiness", which is some ways is analogous to height as in Abraham Lincoln's reply to the jeering question "How long should a man's legs be?" (If, for example, one excises the "in some measure", the original modesty becomes mild arrogance.) SignatureCordially, Eric Walker, Owlcroft House http://owlcroft.com/english/ >> A. "I became filled with a great desire to show people this wonderful >> loveliness, ambition to preserve it." [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] > Version A is not a specially admirable sentence but is better > than version B (wordy and attenuated.) I disagree. I sometimes see things I have no problem with being picked up as comma splices, but in this case I don't think A is even grammatical, let alone suitable for beginners in English. It needs at least "and an" after the comma (then we can debate the comma). SignatureOnline waterways route planner: http://canalplan.org.uk development version: http://canalplan.eu |
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