To boldly split what no fur has split before

[altivo]

Split infinitives. We all do it in conversation without even thinking of it. No one corrects you for it either.

Do it in writing, though, and someone is bound to point it out. We've had it pounded into our furry little heads all our lives, or at least as long as we were in school, that we should never split an English infinitive.

So I was confronted with this little gem tonight:

"Blue seeks to completely destroy the market."

Oops. I split the infinitive. Let's see, how about:

"Blue seeks completely to destroy the market."

No, that's not what I mean. Maybe:

"Blue seeks to destroy the market completely."

Closer, but it loses the desired emphasis I think. In Latin or Greek, where this stupid rule originated, you can't split an infinitive. The reason you can't is that the infinitive is all one word, rather than two as it is in English. The Latin writer or speaker had no choice. It would come out:

"Blue seeks to destroy completely the market." Or perhaps even "Blue seeks the market to destroy completely."

Umm. No. Just no. That might work in German, but it's not English. I think I'll go back and split that infinitive again the way I had it in the first place.

Comments

[brokkentwolf.livejournal.com]

That last one is poetic.

*Goes to destroy the market completely or is it...?*

[altivo.livejournal.com]

*goes to completely destroy his grammar book*

[lobowolf.livejournal.com]

There's good writing, and there's technically correct writing. The two don't always coincide.

I always rather fancied split infinitives ever since Star Trek paved the way for rampant infinitive splitting :D

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Of course I could just write it in Greek. Then no one would read it. ;p

[schnee.livejournal.com]

"Blue seeks the market to destroy completely" actually works, I think, but it changes the meaning to something rather different. :)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yes. Fortunately, Blue seems to be a bumbling idiot. ;p

[doco.livejournal.com]

I must admit I've never been educated about that in the slightest way. Well, other than Star Trek and the Hitch Hiker's Guide, I must admit. :)

Consider yourself lucky your language only has one gender, however, just recently I had to deal with the case that some words tend to behave strangely in Austrian.... "der Service" suddenly mutates to "das Service" in Austria, just because it's a loanword from another language. :P

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Actually I rather enjoy the concept of gender in language. English has only tiny bits of it, but still comes from two traditions that had a full complement: French and Anglo-Saxon. (Don't call a ship "he" or "it" for instance.)

Now you put me in mind of my German teacher in graduate school correcting major errors in my own writing. He circled them and wrote on the page, "Das Kind gemacht ein Geschaft."

[saythename.livejournal.com]

I could never understand diagramming sentences or trying to be hyper-correct
about language. If its intelligible and the meaning comes across then
you've done it right.

Or *looks nervous* maybe its should be If its intelligble and the meaning
comes across, its done well?

>.<

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh there's a lot of latitude in English, even with the strictest rules. I happen to like the subjunctive and use it frequently (when appropriate) both in writing and speaking. People sometimes look at me strangely as if they'd never heard one before, but mostly I get away with it. I also use "whom" which does tend to date me (and not in a good way.)

But if I were (<==hint: subjunctive) going to point out any flaw in either of your examples here, I'd pick on the missing apostrophe in "it's." ;p

*immediately ducks and runs*

[saythename.livejournal.com]

Apostrophe placement is one of my banes. I've
learned that you put them between words that
are combined (as in the "I've" above since its
short for I Have) or to indicate ownership like,
"Sally's guns were locked in a cabinet" showing
that the guns in the cabinet belonged to Sally.

The other grammer demon of mine has been the
three forms of the word There.

"There are three crystals on the table."

"Their crystals were on the table."

"They're crystals!"

Another thing that I've had to actually go
back and study to do well is the placement
of periods and such with quotes. I mean
with dialouge.

"Do I put the question mark inside, or outside
the closing quotation mark?"

"I think you put it inside," he said, "though
a continued dialouge remark makes that simple
rule elusive."

I learned to spell believe by the saying, "never
believe a lie" telling you to put the 'lie' in
the word.

I, very early, learned to spell synthesizer by
thinking of the word as Sin-the-sizer.

Speaking of Synthesizers, (notice no specific
possesive there), and being lost in grammer
rules (like how you can use either parantheses,
or paranetheses and commas, but not just one of each);

^_^

[Error: unknown template video]

[saythename.livejournal.com]

That vid isn't slamming you for nagging, it was
just funny and reminded me of all the teachers
that put blue marks on my writings when I didn't
do things correctly, not because I was unclear (
and THAT is the first rule of language, any
language, ALL language) but because they got paid
to take out their own frustrated writing impulses
by heaping scorn on children and premenantly
insuring that said children would forever stick
out their tounges at those teachers by inventing
netspeak. LMAO! ^_^ LOL!

Alright, I got it out of my system.

=D

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Except for one thing. Most of those rules DO have something to do with being clear about what you are trying to say. Spoken and written language are different in that respect. Writing is often capable of more precision, and you have pointed out some of the reasons for that. The difference between "too/two/to" and "their/they're" and "then/than" are obvious examples. It usually doesn't matter in spoken conversation, but if you're writing a bill of sale or an employment contract, it just might.

As for "its" and "it's" the rule itself is simple. The problem is that it's an exception to the other rules about possessives. That's because "its" is a pronoun and follows the pronoun rules rather than the noun rules. Just as you don't write "her's" and "him's" you don't use "it's" as a possessive. Instead you use "hers" and "his" and "its." You do have the right reason for putting an apostrophe into "it's" when used correctly. That form is a contraction of "it is" and should have the apostrophe, just as we do with "he is" to "he's" or "she is" to "she's."

Legalistically, punctiation goes inside the quotes. I do often break that one though, especially where the quotes are used to specify some computer jargon or other and the punctuation is not part of what is to be conveyed.

[saythename.livejournal.com]

If I use two instead of too or it's instead of its;

Will you still respect me in the morning?

I get the point of what your saying but I still
think that, overall, its about content. Form over
function. An interesting text thats understandable
but not legally correct doesn't get pulled over,
it rolls to the end.

No matter what the Nuns say.

=D

[hellmutt.livejournal.com]

The way I think of it, 'postrophe always means missing letters. Though for possessives like "Dave's" you have to go back to "es" or "Dave his", depending on your view...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

That works too, if you know what the Middle English form would have been. And again, since there are no letters taken from "its" no apostrophe required. ;D

[jmaynard.livejournal.com]

Actually, the whole business about splitting infinitives not being grammatically correct is itself incorrect. It's an attempt to misapply a rule from Latin to English. Split them with abandon, and laugh in the face of any pedant who tries to tell you different.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Oh I agree about the rule being spurious. But the attempts at enforcement become dreary and can often be avoided by not doing it. ;p

[susannag.livejournal.com]

Yep.

And I have happily been splitting infinitives for many years now with "official blessings": those of my parents, the English professors.

I must have been an insufferable student in class - but the English teacher who misspelled words ON THE SPELLING LIST was asking for it.

that guy off in whose camper they were whacking

[dakhun.livejournal.com]

That reminds me of a silly quote: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115641/quotes :-)

How about getting rid of the infinitive altogether, rather than risk splitting it, ie: "Blue seeks completely destroying the market" or "Blue seeks the complete destruction of the market"? Or maybe using punctuation to restore the original emphasis you intended: "Blue seeks to destroy, completely, the market." If you find that you wake up in the middle of the night and realise that it still bothers you, that is (which it probably won't :-).

Re: that guy off in whose camper they were whacking

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Actually, "Blue seeks the complete destruction of the market" does work, though perhaps not in the mouth of the speaker. Come to think of it, Green most likely has no compunction about splitting infinitives anyway. I need to remember that what is in quotes is subject to different rules than what I, the narrator, put in there.

[ruwhei.livejournal.com]

I was going to suggest "Blue seeks complete destruction of the market."

You're right about Split infinitives of course, and language does evolve. I find it mostly useful to encourage more direct language.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yep, that's a good suggestion, and I'll try to remember that next time it comes up. In this case, though, once it dawned on me that the speaker was not the type who would care about splitting an infinitive, I'm going to leave it split.

[kaysho.livejournal.com]

I hate to say it, but for the most part I've trained myself not to split infinitives sufficiently that I talk that way as well. :)

My bugbear that I try to stop myself from doing (and sometimes even succeed) is the misplaced "only".

[altivo.livejournal.com]

That and reading LJ when you should be packing?

I do hope I get to see you at least briefly at MFF. :)

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

We must destroy the market!!!

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, actually not. The objective is first to rescue Argos, and second to save the market from destruction.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

I never get to have any fun *fluffs himself up and sits in the corner pouting*

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You could be a tracker-cat and go find Argos. He's lost in the woods, and being a townie sort of wuff, needs help finding his way to a safe haven. Unfortunately, more adventures are in store before he reaches safety of course.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Well I could but I'm an urban cat, I'm not very good in the country :)