Re: Authors you just cannot get into

On Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:27:23 +0100, carol@xxxxxxxxx (Carol Hague)
wrote:

Lawrence Watt-Evans <lwe@xxxxxxx> wrote:

On Wed, 15 Oct 2008 11:54:38 -0700, "Mike Schilling"
<mscottschilling@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Lawrence Watt-Evans wrote:

Yeah, the Brits are constantly asking why we Yanks have gone and
meddled with the language when in the vast majority of cases the
American form is older, and it's the English who changed it.

The example of this that really struck me is in _Modern English
Usage_, where Fowler describes "maybe" as an ostentatiously archaic
substitute for the everyday word "perhaps".

The one that I first really noticed was "forgotten" -- the past
perfect of "forget," which is just "forgot" in modern English.

I have the impression, though, that the English still have the word
"forgotten," but only as an adjective, not as a verb. (If anyone
British is reading this, do I have that right?)

I'm British and I use both "forgot" and "forgotten" as verb forms. I
*think* I'd be more likely to use "I forgot" for an action I'd neglected
to perform and "I'd forgotten that" for an idea I was reminded of, but
that may just be me.

No, that's the standard usage in the U.S.

"Gotten" OTOH is very little used here AFAIK. As always, regional
variations may apply.

Thanks. I may have been getting "gotten" and "forgotten" confused.




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The final issue of the Hugo-nominated webzine Helix
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