Passive-static Verbs

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Donahue was fanning himself with his straw hat.

OR

Donahue fanned himself with his straw hat.


Snow was falling all the way from Chicago.

OR

Snow fell all the way from Chicago to St.Louis.

OR

Snow fell all the way from Chicago to Missouri, and covered the engine and cars as the train rolled into the St. Louis station.

 

[patientlee]

Donahue was fanning himself with his straw hat.

OR

Donahue fanned himself with his straw hat.

The first is the past progressive. It would indicate to me that while that action continued to happen, something else would happen.

Donahue was fanning himself with a straw hat when a fly landed on his head.

Donahue fanned himself with a straw hat, and a fly landed on his head.

They don't mean the same thing. Am I wrong?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

The first is the present progressive. It would indicate to me that while that action continued to happen, something else would happen.

Donahue was fanning himself with a straw hat when a fly landed on his head.

Donahue fanned himself with a straw hat, and a fly landed on his head.

They don't mean the same thing. Am I wrong?

Good point, tho I wonder if POV doesn't determine the controlling authority, that is, wont a detached observer keep the action trapped in the present, cuz they don't know what the actor intends to do in the future?

 

[SecondCircle]

I've run into a few issues with this myself, and the wording of verbs in this way can have drastically different meanings sometimes.

In one instance, a reader caught it at the very beginning of my story. It was told in first person, past tense. My sentence was "I sat at the table all day...."

That's how I speak, but that's technically not right. I should have wrote "had been sitting" or "was sitting" for it to make sense. "I sat" I guess means you took a seat, that moment. If "I sat" at the table all day, that means I had practiced the art of taking a seat for the duration of the afternoon.

If I "was sitting" at the table all day, I was in the seated position, which was what I had intended to say.

I think.

Some of those give me pause from time to time. And sometimes, it can be so nitpicky and confusing to me that I'm not always sure which way is technically right. It changes with tense and context.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I've run into a few issues with this myself, and the wording of verbs in this way can have drastically different meanings sometimes.

In one instance, a reader caught it at the very beginning of my story. It was told in first person, past tense. My sentence was "I sat at the table all day...."

That's how I speak, but that's technically not right. I should have wrote "had been sitting" or "was sitting" for it to make sense. "I sat" I guess means you took a seat, that moment. If "I sat" at the table all day, that means I had practiced the art of taking a seat for the duration of the afternoon.

If I "was sitting" at the table all day, I was in the seated position, which was what I had intended to say.

I think.

Some of those give me pause from time to time. And sometimes, it can be so nitpicky and confusing to me that I'm not always sure which way is technically right. It changes with tense and context.

Unspecified referential indices are often the problem, we either don't know who the actor is or don't know who the observer is.

 

[PayDay]

Donahue was fanning himself with his straw hat.

OR

Donahue fanned himself with his straw hat.


Snow was falling all the way from Chicago.

OR

Snow fell all the way from Chicago to St.Louis.

OR

Snow fell all the way from Chicago to Missouri, and covered the engine and cars as the train rolled into the St. Louis station.

All I see are complete sentences, except for the last one which needs a ; or a : .

The 1st two can mean the same thing: 'In the process of' or 'has finished doing' .
Both are good for 3rd person.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

All I see are complete sentences, except for the last one which needs a ; or a : .

The 1st two can mean the same thing: 'In the process of' or 'has finished doing' .
Both are good for 3rd person.

I got them from a book published circa 1930.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Re-read the verb chapter of A WRITERS COACH by Jack Hart. Wanted to review all the highlights I made over the years.

http://www.press.uchicago.edu/books/hart/About_Jack_Hart.html

 

[robertreams]

You are correct except that the use of and in the second sentence is incorredt. The two ideas joined by 'and' are not equal and therefore one should be subordinated to the other. This is commonusage but not correct.

 

[robertreams]

Sounds to me as if you meant to say, "I had been sitting at the table all day." a lot depends on what one decides to say next. "I was sitting at the table all day," sounds to me like the answer to the question, "where were you today?"