The Cambridge History of the English Language Volume 4 Part 3 potx

David Denison

In their corpus Ryden and Brorstrom recorded the construction 40 times

altogether with 17 different verbs (for example ADVANCE , COME , MIS ­

CARRY , MELT ) , but apart from G O they do not find it after the 1860/70s

(1987: 25). (Nor do I in my corpus.) Their explanation for this curious and

apparendy pleonastic doubling of auxiliaries is that it stressed the resulta￾tive aspect more emphatically than the B E perfect alone, which was

ambiguous between past action and resultant state. Notice that the effect

of (123) in clauses with an adverbial of duration can be achieved in PDE

by such expressions as:

(124) a. He has been away since four o'clock,

b. Yve been back a fortnight ('two weeks')

with a predicative in place of the past participle, suggesting that the

functional need has survived the general obsolescence of the B E perfect

(and perhaps that gone in B E gone should now be analysed as a predicative). 3 9

The /0-phrase of (123a), however, suggests that has/had been gone still

contained verbal G O in the late eighteenth century.

3.3.2.4 Perfect of main verb B E

A peculiar use of the perfect has arisen with main verb BE , allowing the

latter to behave under certain circumstances as if it were a verb of

motion: 4 0

(125) Have you been to Paris?

This B E + /0-phrase in the sense Visit' cannot be used without perfect

HAV E — or alternatively, can only occur in past participle form:

(126) a. ** Were you ever to Paris, (cf. Were you ever in Paris?)

b. **I may be to Paris, (cf. I may go to Paris.)

Warner (1993: 45, 64), following the OED, explicidy suggests that B E +

directional phrase was grammatical with forms other than been until c. 1760,

though the QfiDhas only 'modern' (i.e. c. 1887) citations (s.v. be v. B6). (It

is the construction of (128) which is well attested in earlier English.) Here

is the modern construction:

(127) a. 'Have you then been to Sir Robert?'

'I have been to Cavendish-square, but there, it seems, he has not

appeared all night'...

(1782 Burney, Cecilia (Bell, 1890) II.v.140 [WWP])

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Syntax

b. 'I've beenl says Jack, 'to Orchard-street to-night, | To see what

play this Milky Dame could write.' [original italics for

Orchard-street and Milky Dame\

(1791 Ann Yearsley, Earl Goodwin (Robinson), Epilogue p. 92 [WWP])

c. he had ben to the West-Indies

(1795 Benjamin Dearborn, Columbian Grammar 114 [Sundby,

Bjo'rge & Haugland])

Sundby, Bjo'rge & Haugland (1991: 291) quote (127c) from a usage book,

where it is apparendy castigated as improper and vulgar. It is unclear to me

whether the 'impropriety' marks a recent innovation or a relic. Visser points

out that its meaning of 'go and come back' is shared with the somewhat

older construction where to introduces an infinitive rather than an NP

(1963-73: section 175):

(128) To-day, after I had been to see additional houses taken on for the

Armenian refugees, I dropped into the new shop of an old

acquaintance (1918 Bell, Letters 11.442 (31 Jan.))

Example (127b) also contains a /^-infinitive. Note, however, that older

occurrences like (128), especially in counterfactual use, can be hard to

distinguish from modal, BE :

(129) I am sure had I been to undergo onything of that nature .. . I would

hae skreigh'd ['screeched'] out at once

(1816 Scott, Antiquary, 2nd edn. I.xi.233 [Visser])

(130) I am glad you were to see the Miners' Committee: you evidently

learn a great deal that way

(1891 Sidney Webb, Letters 163 1.304 (18 Sep.))

However, modal B E has been confined effectively to finite use (see 3.3.5.2

below), ruling out the perfect of modal B E found in (129), while B E 'go in

order to . . . and come back', as apparently in (130), 4 1

is now only possible

with the perfect, so the two usages are in complementary distribution.

The OED implicitly relates the 'motion-verb' use of B E to the nine￾teenth-century B E off/away, 'a graphic expression for to go at once, take

oneself off (s.v. beBJb). Perhaps more recent still (because not mentioned

in the OED) is an obviously analogical pattern whose locative phrase does

not involve the preposition to:

(131) a. Have you been across the Humber Bridge?

b. Vve never been round Manchester Town Hall

J

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David Denison

And another development in colloquial BrE has and + past participle

instead of to + infinitive, with connotations of criticism:

(132) They've been and spilled wine on the floor.

(PDE [Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik])

On this see further section 3.6.6.7 below.

3.3.2.5 Unreality and double perfect

A correlation has developed between unrealised action and the use of the

HAV E perfect in certain contexts. The prescriptive tradition frowns upon

some of the patterns with double use of HAVE , e.g. would have liked to have

gone, consisting of the two verbal groups would have liked and to have gone,

even though each is well formed. Some examples are unreal conditionals,

where HAV E may appear in the protasis, the apodosis (see 3.3.2.2 above),

or both, but the usage is not confined to conditionals:

(133) a. I intended to have been at Chichester this Wednesday — but on

account of this sore throat I wrote him (Brown) my excuse

yesterday (1818 Keats, Letters 98 p. 257 (Dec.))

b. *Your husband, aunt? I thought he had been dead?

(1849-50 Dickens, David Copperfteld xlvii.587)

c. 'I did so want to have gone with him,' answered she, looking

wistfully towards the town.

(1850 Gaskell, Moorland Cottage iii.291)

(134) a. if you .. . I will so dismiss you through that doorway, that you

had better have been motherless from your cradle.

(1855-7 Dickens, LittleDorritl.v.51)

b. since Miss Brooke decided that it [sc. a puppy] had better not

have been born. (1871-2 George Eliot, Middlemarch iii.30)

In (133) the HAV E would nowadays tend to appear in the higher clause (/

had intended to be, I had thought he was dead, I had so wanted to go); further exam￾ples like (133b) are given as (494).

The frequent use of HAV E as a signal of unreality, always in the form of

an infinitive when in an apodosis, since there has to be a modal there, can

lead to a parallel use of infinitive have in the protasis too, even if finite HAV E

is there already. The resulting double HAV E is still regarded as non￾standard, but it has been found since the fifteenth century and is very

frequent in colloquial PDE. In the following literary examples it is part of

the depiction of non-standard, lower-class or dialectal speech, though in

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(135c) the fictional speaker is a highly educated young American and the

spelling <of> may serve to contrast non-standard Fd've been with standard

wouldn't've noticed:

(135) a. and if Yd ha known it, I'd ha' christened poor Jack's mermaid

wi' some grand gibberish of a name.

(1848 Gaskell, Mary Barton xiii.159)

b. T'm thankful you begin with "well!" If you y ha9

begun with

"but," as you did afore, I'd not ha' listened to you . . .'

(1851-3 Gaskell, Cranford xiv.129)

c. . . . 'Did he notice?' I said. 'Your dad?'

'Naw. He was three sheets to the wind. If Yd of been the

bartender [original emphasis on bar] at the Oak Room he

wouldn't have noticed.' (1992 Tartt, Secret History ii.57)

d. 'Well, I raly would not [original emphasis] ha' believed it,

unless I had ha' happened to ha' been here!' said Mrs. Sanders.

(1836-7 Dickens, Pickwick xxvi.393)

e. 'I'll swear there ain't no ring there,' she said. 'I should 'a' seen

it if there had 'a been' (1907 Nesbit, Enchanted Castle iv.87)

f. I wish we hadn'ta moved so fast with the sonofabitch.

(1987 Wolfe, Bonfire of the Vanities (Cape, 1988) xix.409)

The syntagm seen in the first clause of (135a) is variously expanded as had

have Ved and would have Ved, both by syntacticians and in attested instances,

though it is commonest with contracted'd for the first verb.

Suppose we treat the construction as involving double HAV E (certainly

correct for (135d-f )). 4 2

One analysis would treat the first HAV E as modal,

since it appears to be followed by an infinitive. It is then anomalous in

lacking an obligation sense and in not requiring to, as in the pattern

(136) Before an X-ray they have to have gone without food for a whole

day.

Example (136) shows how modal HAV E normally behaves. An alternative

analysis of (135d—f), which I prefer, takes both HAVE S as perfect, the first

marking anteriority (central use of the perfect) and the second unreality

(secondary use): each function is separately realised. The morphological

oddity then consists in the fact that the second auxiliary is an infinitive

rather than a past participle despite being in the HAV E perfect, rather as

Dutch auxiliaries followed by an infinitive behave when they themselves

have a perfect auxiliary (Geerts, Haeseryn, de Rooij & van der Toorn 1984:

523-5). 4 3

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David Denison

Further evidence of a strong association between unreality and the

infinitive of HAV E is the kind of sentence illustrated by (137a):

(137) a. Why couldn't you have done what I asked?

b. Why couldn't you do what I asked?

Example (137a) is given by Palmer as a surprising variant of the expected

(137b) and is used, he claims, to resolve a possible ambiguity between

present conditional could and the intended meaning of past possibility,

'Why weren't you able to . . . ?' (1990: 97). As he points out, though, the

form (137a) has a natural reading which is also inappropriate: Wh y

wouldn't you have been able to . . . ?' He suggests that this new ambiguity

may be less important. Perhaps, rather, the unreality suggested by HAV E

CYou didn't do what I asked. Why not?') is what is most salient.

Finally here we must note that a new stressed form, of, has been created

from the unstressed enclitic y

ve\

(138) Had I known of your illness I should not of written in such fiery

phrase in my first Letter. (1819 Keats, Letters 149 p. 380 (5 Sep.))

Many speakers thus apparently fail to see any connection between a non￾initial, infinitival occurrence of HAV E in a verbal group and the normal aux￾iliary. The spelling is appearing more and more often in literary

representations of dialogue, and not always — as it was in literature until the

mid-twentieth century — as a mark of non-standard usage; cf. (135c).

3.3.2.6 Clipped perfect

Incomplete perfect clauses may lack subject NP and HAVE ; for interroga￾tives the equivalent ellipsis is of HAV E and/or subject NP:

(139) a. 'Been pretty hot today,' he remarked.

'Is it a record?' I asked eagerly.

(1953 Hardey, Go-Between (Heinemann, 1971) viii.104 [Visser])

b. Gerald went up to the woman.

'Taken much?' he asked (1907 Nesbit, Enchanted Castle iii.62)

Visser suggests that such forms 'may have been current for a long time in

spontaneous conversation', but that they 'did not become common in

written or printed English until the beginning of the twentieth century'

(1963—73: section 2054). (His generous collection of examples includes

just one from the nineteenth century and a highly dubious one from the

early seventeenth.) We may add:

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(140) a. I shall insinuate some of these Creatures into a Comedy some

day .. . Scene, a litde Parlour . . . Ha! Hunt! got into you<r>

new house? Ha! Mf s

Novello seen Altam and his Wife?

(1818 Keats, Utters 98 p. 254 (18 Dec.))

b. JACK . .. . Whiere is your husband?

RACHAEL . Gone, as a last hope, to try to borrow.

(1832 Jerrold, Rent Day Il.i, in Works (Bradbury & Evans, 1854)

VIII.23 [ARCHER])

c. ROY . Well, father, I've done it!

GRIFFITH . Done what? [Sees him] Enlistedl

(1899 Herne,^ . GriffithDavenport IVp. 149 [ARCHER])

Such elliptical forms are part of a broader phenomenon in which a string

may be ellipted from (usually) the beginning of a clause.

3.3.3 Progressive: B E + -ing

The progressive construction, as in I was swimming, has undergone some of

the most striking syntactic changes of the IModE period. By early in the

ModE period the B E + -ing pattern was already well established, and its

overall frequency has increased continuously ever since. Dennis (1940)

estimates an approximate doubling every century from 1500, though with a

slowing-down in the eighteenth century and a spurt at the beginning of the

nineteenth (Strang 1982: 429). Arnaud, working from a corpus of private

letters and extrapolating to the speech of literate, middle-class people, esti￾mates a threefold increase during the nineteenth century alone (1983: 84).

3.3.3.1 Meaning and grammaticalisation

The rules for use of the progressive had already been established in the

grammar before our period — in the seventeenth century, according to

Strang (1982: 429) — though, as she says, 'in all generations, including the

present, there are contexts in which choice is possible, and the choices of

some are surprising to others' (1982: 430). Here are some instances where

nonuse of the progressive is odd to my ears:

(141) a. Now I will return to Fanny — it rains.

(1818 Keats, Utters 75 p. 170 (3 Jul.))

b. if I had refused it — I should have behaved in a very bragadochio

dunderheaded manner (ibid. 98 p. 257 (Dec.))

c. How is Mr. Evelyn? How does he bear up against so sudden a

reverse? (1840 Bulwer-Lytton, Money V.ii p. 226)

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d. What do they say? asked Margaret of a neighbour in the

crowd, as she caught a few words, clear and distinct from the

general murmur. (1848 Gaskell, Mary Barton v.72)

e. \ .. Dover says he will take a good deal of the plate back

again, and any of the jewellery we like. He really behaves very

well.' (1871-2 Eliot, Middlemarch lviii.596)

f. Let me know how your chap. [= chapter] proceeds & what you

think of no I [sic — number one].

(1890 Dowson, Letters 105 p. 156 (25 Jun.))

g. Suddenly he caught sight of a canvas with its face to the wall

. . . he wondered what it did there.

(1919 Maugham, Moon & Sixpence (Heinemann, 1955) xxxix.152)

And here are some converse examples:

(142) a. \ .. A water-party; and by some accident she was falling over￾board. He caught her.' (1816 Austen, Emma viiifxxvi] .218 [Phillipps])

b. What I should have lent you ere this if I could have got it, was

belonging to poor Tom (1819 Keats, Letters 110 p. 277 (Feb.))

According to Strang, the use of the progressive altered in character

during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, at least as far as

literary narrative was concerned (1982: 441—2):

In narrative prose of the first half of the eighteenth century the

construction is truly at home only in certain types of subordinate clause,

especially temporal, relative or local... In the latter half of the eighteenth

century the figures rise overall, but proportionately most in non￾subordinate use [footnote omitted], so that in the century as a whole

there are nearly three times as many uses in subordinate clauses, though

these clauses are themselves in a minority. Taking the nineteenth century

as a whole .. . the overall rate of occurrence has more than doubled, but

the rate in non-subordinate clauses has nearly quadrupled. .. . In the

twentieth-century [sic] the overall rate has again more than doubled, but

again this conceals a near-quadrupling in non-subordinate clauses .. .

See also section 3.3.3.4 for another approach to the grammaticalisation of

the progressive. Strang's analysis of the spread of the progressive is subtle.

She notes that Richardson, for example, distinguishes the language of

Pamela from other letter-writers in the eponymous novel by a greatly raised

rate of usage of the progressive. Strang counts instances in novels around

1800 and generally finds a huge increase in the use of the progressive in

past tense narrative prose between the first or early novel(s) and subsequent

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