Various, as they say, items
Fear not, faithful reader(s), updates are a-coming. Other considerations, however, weigh heavily upon me.
I’ve started keeping a little notebook of language-related phenomena that I want to look at in the future. A sample, you say? All right…
-NP put NP into {*sleep / *a sleep / a sleep that would last 100 years / a deep sleep} Hmm…Zimmer principle, anyone? (okay, not really) Note that the * above do not mean “unattested,” because alas, Google reveals unto all the blinding truth.
-sooner is better vs. *better is sooner Equation, anyone?
-Lexical units that name the role of an undergoer in some transitive action, but are not derived from a verb that denotes that action. So far: victim, effects (as in ‘his effects’), ware, and possibly original.
-He let me do anything = ‘He let me do anything I wanted to do’ -Let me do anything! = ‘Let me do anything I want to do’ (though rather stilted) -Let me do something…anything! = ‘Let me do something, anything is fine.’
And now, as they, as they say, “say,” good night. (or is that “And now, as, as they say, ‘they say,’ good night”?)