[projectaon] Re: Editor's Companion Submission
- From: "David Davis" <feline1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <projectaon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 1 Jan 2005 17:18:11 -0000
Again, I seem to have missed the corrections that Jonathan is commenting
on here, by anyways...
----- Original Message -----
> (??) 04wotw 223 #1: [jb: I think the phrase "that speed ..." modifies
> "denizens" rather than "onslaught". Basically, you must survive the onslaught
> of those denizens who are coming for you, rather than the idea of surviving
> the denizen's onslaught that rushes toward you. So, "speed".]
The original text is OK.
The clauses stack up as: "You survive the onslaught (of the denizens {that
speed towards you})
> (??) 04wotw 221 #1: [jb: In this instance, I believe that it is more
> appropriate for the javelins to arc as individuals rather than the volley
> itself arcing. Very subjective in this case, but it is legal to have a group
> subject use a plural verb when acting as individuals. Very subjective. So,
> "arc"]
The original text is OK.
Think of it as one of those "a something of somethings" English constructions
(collective nouns). It's more common to say the whole collective phrase
in full, rather than just the collective noun on its own.
(eg "a pride of lions", "a gaggle of geese"... you never introduce a 'gaggle'
into your paragraph without at least having said the full "gaggle of geese"
phrase first).
Because the collected noun itself is always in its plural form in these
contructions, it sounds more natural for the verb to to be in the plural
form as well...
...thus the javelins arc, rather than the volley arcs
(because you don't say the volley on its own, you say {the volley of
javelins} arc
In fact, it's probably easiest to think of the collective noun as behaving
more like an adjective...
> (??) 04wotw 217 #2: [jb: Agreed, "enchantment".]
Yeah it's a generic use of enchantment.
> (??) 04wotw 216 #1: [jb: I think this is strange enough that I vote
for "pupil-less".]
Yuk! two hyphenated letter l's, I think that looks very ugly -
I much prefer Ian Page's "pupiless"
DAVID
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