> On 28 Nov 2003, "Dr. Jason Gastrich" <news@jcsm.org> screwed up his
> face, groaned, pushed hard, and farted out the following message in
> news:__Qxb.55747$t01.44819@twister.socal.rr.com:
>
> > Ariaan wrote:
> >> Mike Ruskai wrote:
> >>> On Fri, 28 Nov 2003 16:41:36 +0100, Uncle Davey wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> By the same token, in exchange for pointing out your split
> >>>> infinitive, I now am duty bound to think up a preposition to end
> >>>> this sentence with.
> >>>
> >>> Not to pick on you personally, but this seems as good a time as any
> >>> to point out that there's nothing ungrammatical about split
> >>> infinitives or ending sentences with prepositions.
> >>>
> >>> There is, in fact, no official body to determine what is or is not
> >>> proper grammar in English. Those who take it upon themselves to
> >>> dictate grammar are always subservient to actual usage, whether they
> >>> admit it or not.
> >>>
> >>> Since split infinitives and sentences ending in a preposition have
> >>> clear and unambiguous meanings (all else being equal), they are
> >>> perfectly grammatical.
> >>>
> >>> For those who are curious, the nonsense with split infinitives
> >>> derives from the fact that in other languages on which English is
> >>> based (in variously sized parts), infinitives are single words, and
> >>> therefore by their very nature unsplittable.
> >>>
> >>> In German, for example, the equivalent of the English "to eat" is
> >>> "essen". The German equivalent of "hungrily" is "hungrig". You
> >>> can't put one word in the middle of another, so "to eat hungrily" is
> >>> "hungrig essen". Even in unconventional order, "essen hungrig", the
> >>> infinitive remains whole, simply because it's a single word.
> >>
> >> Tsk. Those two words together do not make one infinitive at all.
> >> 'Hungrig' is an adjunct or modifier. Only 'eat' can make up the
> >> infinitive, because only 'eat' is a verb. 'Hungrig essen', or 'eating
> >> hungrily' for that matter, are not some sort of 'compound' verb. Come
> >> on!
> >> Splitting an infinitive in German would be to take the verb
> >> 'abseilen' and breaking it up in 'ab' and 'seilen' for use in the
> >> following sentence: Wir seilten die letzten Meters ab.
> >> That, my friend, is splitting an infinitive; what you said is simply
> >> placing the modifier elsewhere in the sentence.
> >>
> >>> In English, however, the infinitive is not a single word. It is no
> >>> less clear saying "to hungrily eat" than "to eat hungrily".
> >>
> >> Wrong, as stated above.
> >>
> >>> Depending on what follows, it may be even more clear. For example,
> >>> the strictly grammatic (according to wankers with too much time on
> >>> their hands) form might be, "to eat hungrily the large meal
> >>> provided." To most English speakers, it would be more natural and
> >>> more clear to say "to hungrily eat the large meal provided". This
> >>> is because it's more clear in the second example that there's
> >>> something further on in the sentence that is being eaten.
> >>>
> >>> I don't know off hand where the panic about ending sentences with
> >>> prepositions comes from. Perhaps it's simply the name "preposition"
> >>> itself, which implies that the position being described comes before
> >>> the object it applies to. That's not the modern usage, obviously,
> >>> because a word doesn't cease to be a preposition by being placed
> >>> after the object to which it applies. One can hardly complain about
> >>> a sentence ending with a preposition if the word is no longer a
> >>> preposition by virtue of being at the end.
> >
> > You guys better stay on Ariaan's good side. He's a linguist (and he
> > can get a little nasty).
>
> Yes, and I have no problem with saying I fully disagree with him on the
> subject of split infinitives. I will change my stance if he can
> rephrase the following to retain the dramatic impact of the phrase, yet
> remove the split infinitive:
>
> "To boldly go where no man has gone before..."
>
> Proper usage, according to you at least, would be:
>
> "Boldly to go where no man has gone before..."
> or
> "To go boldly where no man has gone before..."
> or
> "To go where no man has gone before boldly..."
>
> None of these strike one as the original did.
>
> --
> Mekkala, Atheist #2148
> "Atheism is ... the bed-rock of sanity in a world of madness."
> --Emmett F. Fields
I can only suggest we look at how the star trek lead in translates into
German:
Space, the final frontier
Lebensraum, die Endloesung.
These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise
Ich bin ein Berliner des Sternsturmtruppenluftwaffe Untersuchungstechnik
Its five year mission
Ihre stalinistische Fuenf-Jahres-Plan
To seek out new life, new civilisation
Zu neuem Lebensborn, neuen Reichen, neuen Fuehrern 'Achtung, Achtung, Sieg
Heil' zu schreien
To boldly go where no man has gone before
Da von Arbeit freigemacht zu werden wo kein Arsch vorher von Arbeit
freigemacht worden ist.
Doo-doooh-doo-doo-doo-dooooh
Du du liegst mir im Herzen
Doo-doooh-doo-doo-doo-dooh
Du du, liegst mir im Sinn
Dooooh-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo -dooooh
Du du machst mir viel Scherzen
Doo-doooh-doo-doo-doo-doo-dooooooooooh
Weiss nicht, wie gut ich Dir bin.
I think you will find the German version more dramatic than the English
version, with its lousy split infinitive.
Best,
Uncle Davey
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