Post by Anton ShepelevPost by jerryfriedmanIt's not too far off. Wikipedia cites four writers
condemning split infinitives before Alford, but Alford was
the one who made the condemnation well known.
This is true. What I called nonsense, however, is the
Post by jerryfriedmanThe rule against splitting infinitives is often attributed
to Victorian grammarian Henry Alford
The rule had been in effect for hundreds of years prior,
although not explicitly stated, because universally (albeit
subconsciously ant intuitively) understood by careful
speakers of English. The condemnations appeared as a
reaction to increeping violations of that rule.
Yes, there are several more or less famous condemners of the
split infinitive, but their arguments are either subjective
(e.g. appealing to taste) or otherwise doubtful (e.g.
appealing to Latin grammar).
Post by jerryfriedman(I added at least one of those citations to the
Wikiparticle, and contributed a lot of other things to
it.)
Thanks, it is good work indeed.
Thanks. It needs a lot more work, in my opinion.
One thing that's simply wrong is that the line
"The Cottar's Saturday Night" is standard
English, not Scots.
Post by Anton ShepelevPost by jerryfriedmanSplit infinitives had indeed almost disappeared,
But those early examples do not mention the split infinitive
in the narrow sense, with a -ly adverb as the wedge, nor
does the Shakespeare quote, /to pitied be/, which sounds great
to me: strong and hard.
Post by jerryfriedmanbut they became more common in the late 18th and the 19th
century. Wikipedia mentions Daniel Defoe, Benjamin
Franklin, William Wordsworth, Abraham Lincoln, George
Eliot, and Robert Burns.
The Burns quote, /to nobly stem/, is a genuine split
infinitive. Having read and enjoyed /Robinson Crusoe/, as
well as some selected sermons of Donne, I cannot recall a
single split infinitive there. It must be /very/ rare in
those writers. I seem to remember dangling participle in
/Crusoe/, yet I think thewe are not due to any sloppiness.
A lot of these examples come from an article by one
Fitzedward Hall in the /American Journal of
Philology/ in 1882. The ones from Donne are all
from his translation from Aristeus, specifically
"'To judicially weigh,' 'to strongly sustaine,' 'to
always have,' 'to well rule or governe,' 'to well
rule one’s selfe.', Rev. Dr. John Donne (died 1631),
/Auncient History of the Septuagint/ (ed. 1633),
pp. 47, 51. 107, 127."
https://archive.org/stream/americanjournal314unkngoog/americanjournal314unkngoog_djvu.txt
https://www.jstor.org/stable/287307?seq=5
Although I found reputable people saying that there
were many examples in Donne's sermons, and that he
was "specially addicted" to the construction, I
looked through a good chunk of extracts from his
sermons without finding any examples.
Hall's example from Defoe is "'To just waft them over.'
Defoe, /A New Voyage/, etc. (1725), p. 152 (ed.
1840)."
He has many pages of examples.
Post by Anton ShepelevPost by jerryfriedmanPost by Anton ShepelevThe rule is based on the principle of cohesion, or the
keeping of related elements together.
I From that you can conclude that the adverb is often
connected to the verb more closely than the "to" is.
I never see it that way. The infinitive is the basic
syntatic framework, to which the adverb may be added as a
decoration as it were, eiher from behind or in the front,
but never in the middle.
To me, the important connection is between the two
elements with meaning--though it's often natural for
me to put the adverb at the end, after the complement
of the verb.
Theoretical questions aside, this construction is
now part of English idiom and is sometimes the best
way to say something.
Post by Anton ShepelevPost by jerryfriedmanCompare "I will not go", for example.
Here, /not/ is tightly bound to /will/. In /I love you
not/, however, the /not/ is negating the preceding sentence
entire.
I don't believe there's any such distinction.
Post by Anton ShepelevPost by jerryfriedmanActually, other things than cohesion are involved in word
order.
Indeed, not to mention that cohesion itself is a many-layered
thing, permeating speech from word level all the way up to
the general outline of the composition.
True, and that in a linear sentence, you may
not be able to have things next to each
other that go together.
Post by Anton ShepelevPost by jerryfriedmanFor instance, at least in English, long sentence elements
tend to go to the end.
I think that tendency has intensified only in the last 100
years, so that the logically worded question "Of what is it a
picture?" has become "What is it a picture of?"
Again, "of" goes with both "What" and "picture",
and I'd say "of" goes more with the meaningful
word than with the merely grammatical one. But
again (again), this construction has been part
of English idiom for many centuries and is
often a good way to say something, though it's
not as useful as split infinitives.
--
Jerry Friedman
--