“HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
As a language lover, one of the joys of my daily life last year was helping Audrey (17) with her English homework. I had never really cared for English as a subject myself, though the further I got in college, the more I began to realize that I actually love it, in a way.So anyway, the other day I was pleased to receive an e-mail from Audrey with a subject line of, “HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” It was nice to know that in addition to being missed as a sister, I am still considered a resource for her tougher English assignments. :o)
This assignment was a “put the sentence together in the correct order” exercise. For example:
city/is/the/Scotland/capital/Edinburgh/of
Edinburg is the capital city of Scotland.
Audrey did four out of five of these things on her own with only incidental mistakes, but one of them came to me like this:
stands/on/Liffey/a/surrounded/plain/Dublin/along/hills/the/River/by
?????????????????????????????????????????????????????
THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is today’s Quick Quiz for Grammar Buffs. Brother Joe and I did the best we could (even involving a side geography lesson of our own) and sent back our best guess. I, for one, would like to see your best guess. And no peeking at the other responses before you try! So, can we English speakers come to a consensus on the sentence order, or am I going to have to ask Audrey for the answer key? ;o)
Well, whether I was right or wrong, Audrey sent me a follow-up e-mail to say, “MERCI!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” I know, I know, I yem zuh best. [Possibly my favorite French catch phrase. The French don't even try to put on an English accent for this one, and I like it that way.]
posted by Kate @ 11:16 PM
16 Comments:
Tricky!
I would say:
Dublin stands on a plain surrounded by hills along the Liffey River.
But I would think there would be several "correct" answers (some maybe less elegant than others). For example, is it "the River Liffey" or "the Liffey River"? As Bullwinkle would say, both are correct.
I look forward to seeing others' answers.
Bess
Dublin stands on a plain surrounded by hills along the River Liffey.
That's my guess.
My best guess: Dublin stands on a plain surrounded by hills along the River Liffey.
I concur with the others:
"Dublin stands on a plain surrounded by hills along the Liffey River."
Any way you look at it, it's a rather awkwardly-constructed sentence.
A plain along the River Liffey surrounded Dublin ...
The River Liffey stands along ...
Surrounded by the River Liffey, Dublin ...
dang.
It is an awkward sentence, and not even a geographically correct one, as the River Liffey actually runs through Dublin. And the hills are actually mountains.
But as a language student, I'm grateful for awkward sentences because otherwise I would have a very hard time translating something that sounded exactly as it should. And English is a really ridiculous language.
English is not as ridiculous as German!
I think German makes more sense structurally. Sure, they slap stuff together until they have the Longest Word Known To Man, but at least they're consistent.
Not really. German has a lot of rules, but they all have lots of exceptions, just like in English. Not to mention the ridiculousness of having gendered nouns.
For more on the ridiculousness of German, consult Mark Twain: http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/texts/twain.german.html
Dublin stands on, surrounded by the hills, along the Liffey River Plain.
Poetic, if I do say so myself.
Amanda Wittmann
Well Kate, are you going to tell us who is right? I want to know if I should award myself a dot or a star.
Stand on, Dublin. Stand on.
Wow, thanks for playing, everyone!
Yeah, Joe and I ended up with "On a plain, Dublin stands along the Liffey River surrounded by hills", which I didn't entirely like at the time, but as we were under time constraints, sent anyway (figuring something's better than nothing). I like your “Dublin stands on a plain surrounded by hills along the Liffey River” (or “River Liffey”) answers better than mine. (There’s your gold star, Lindsey!) One point where I'm admittedly weak in language is in an under-the-gun capacity with a narrow request. :o) I agree that it is an awkward sentence any way you slice it, though, making me feel just a tad better.
And while I can't speak to German, I can speak to the difficulty levels of English vs. French. The longer I was in France, the more I became convinced that English is harder to learn than French. Exceptions though French may have, they're pretty consistent exceptions in most cases. I mean, I learned relatively few new things during my time there (relatively), and mostly just reinforced what I had learned in school, meaning my textbooks really DID teach me a language. How amazing that books can contain such an elusive thing! And boy, did I have a time trying to research and explain English idiosyncrasies to English Language Learners! The funny thing is, every time I confided to a French person that I believed English is harder to learn, they contradicted me! So do I really know what I think I know? I dunno.
yay! I found YOUR blog. thanks for posting!
On a plain(,) surrounded by hills, Dublin stands along the Liffey River (or River Liffey).
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