Tag grammar

Universal Translator: Pronoun

Sue Archer 12 Comments

Dear Editor: Unsurprisingly, my colleague The Unlearned Dresgjas Sjart-Iiih grasps the incorrect end of the tree waste when he pontificates about nouns. He asserts that humans are primitive beings obsessed with naming objects, when in fact their complex culture is built on the ritual avoidance of nouns. I will attempt to set the record straight with this entry.

Pronouns. Words that take the place of nouns, so that these nouns cannot be specifically identified.

Types of Pronouns. Humans have demonstrated their cultural sophistication by dividing their pronouns into several categories.

Indefinite Pronoun: A pronoun used to avoid blame when an act has been performed that is contrary to social expectations. For example, when humans are challenged for putting forth a nonsensical idea, they will state “Everyone thinks that!” Or when someone’s fermented beverage is missing from any cooling device, the chief suspect can remark that “Anyone could have done it.”

Interrogative Pronoun: A pronoun used by human interrogators to force another human to reveal a specific noun: “What was taken?” Who did it?” “Which way did he go?” These pronouns require special care, and are only used by those with special roles in human society, such as mothers or expert swordsmen.

Inigo asking the Man in Black "Who are you?"

In this recording, the interrogator asks a ritually masked man “Who are you?” and is unable to force a noun from him. This demonstrates the strong taboo against nouns.

Demonstrative Pronoun: A pronoun used by humans to avoid identifying things when they are being interrogated. When asked what is missing, for example, a human can wave one of their appendages in a random geometrical pattern and say, “You mean those? Or these?”

Personal Pronoun: A pronoun that deliberately protects a human or valued object from being named and coming to the attention of any jealous, wrathful deities. When taking notice of either an accomplishment or a failure, a human will make statements like “I did it” or “That’s yours.”

Intensive Pronoun: A pronoun used by important humans to compensate for their lack of a specific name and regain social status: “I myself believe that I am the most favoured of the gods.” An intensive pronoun can also be reused by these humans as a reflexive pronoun when admiring themselves in a mirror as an object: “I have taken an ocular impression of myself, and I look shiny during this diurnal cycle.”

Relative Pronoun: A pronoun that prevents the overuse of a noun when there is no choice but to name something or someone. This pronoun relates back to the noun. For example: “The Unlearned Dresgjas Sjart-Iiih, who is woefully ignorant, should employ my superior anthropological methodology in the future to ensure accurate scholarship.”

Entry submitted by The Superior Antarinalia Ravannilah of the planet Trin-La

(Editor’s Note: Find a real Earth expert next time – if there is such a thing!)

***

Image of Inigo Montoya from one of my favourite movies ever, The Princess Bride

Stay tuned for future entries on other parts of speech. 🙂 If you missed the entry on nouns, you can find it here. As always, I welcome any feedback. Was this post helpful for you? Superior alien minds want to know!

When Writing Turns to the Dark Side: My New Year’s Resolution

Sue Archer 29 Comments

There is no such thing as bad writing.

There is no such thing as bad writing.

I’ve decided this is my mantra for the New Year. And I hope you will join in with me.

I can hear what you’re thinking…what about that paragraph I wrote with all those horrible mistakes? Or the slogan I read the other day with the misplaced apostrophe? Or that sentence that violates everything my elementary school English teacher held dear? I want to pull out my hair, it’s so terrible!

It’s time to channel Obi-Wan Kenobi. Look at yourself in the mirror, wave your hand in the air, and tell your inner critic:

There is no such thing as bad writing. This just isn’t the writing you’re looking for.

jedimindcontrol

If Obi-Wan can do it, so can you.

Encountering the Empire

I went through school at a time when learning grammar was not fashionable. I was lucky to have grasped the general concept of a noun or a verb. I learned most of my grammar through reading—what I think of as “practical” grammar. And I guess I mastered it sufficiently, because I went on to pursue a degree in English.

I remember a day when one of my professors returned an essay to me. There was a note scrawled in pencil beside one of my carefully crafted sentences: “split infinitive.”

Split what now?

It sounded vaguely Einsteinian, like the theory of relativity. This was supposed to be an English class!

So I dutifully looked it up. And discovered that one of my favourite phrases from Star Trek, “To boldly go where no one has gone before,” was grammatically incorrect.

This was shocking to me. How could something so poetic be wrong?

According to certain English language authorities, the infinitive form of a verb (“to go”) can’t be divided up by another word, such as an adverb (“boldly”). This no-no is called a split infinitive.

Apparently those Star Trek writers should have said, “To go boldly where no one has gone before.”

Ick.

Over time, I encountered more of these kinds of rules. “Never end a sentence with a preposition.” “Never start a sentence with a conjunction.” It was enough to make my head spin. I wondered if I knew how to write after all.

My confidence slid further when discussing the act of writing with other English students. I encountered people who were downright nasty about writing that did not follow “the rules.” After all, if Strunk & White said we should do it a certain way, then that’s the way it was. And if you didn’t know this, then you were horribly ignorant and should be stopped.

Since I am a fan of all things science fiction, this attitude inevitably reminded me of the evil Empire from Star Wars. The leaders of the Empire believed all planets should be ruled according to their dictates. Anyone who objected had to be punished.

I was left with no choice but to join the Rebel Alliance.

Frozen in Carbonite

To obtain some ammunition in the war on confusing grammar rules, I researched the split infinitive. How had this rule come about? Had it been around since the beginning of modern English—a long time ago (in a galaxy not so far away)?

Nope.

Writers have been splitting infinitives for a long time. There’s evidence that this has been going on as a normal practice since at least the thirteenth century. [1]

The attack on split infinitives began in the 1800s, when scholars attempted to standardize grammar. Up until that point, English speakers were wandering around linguistically like a bunch of rogue Han Solos. They developed the language based on the needs of the day. Then along came a select few intellectuals who attempted to freeze our language in carbonite. They thought English should be more dignified and structured, like Latin. Never mind that Latin was a dead language.

Han-Solo-Carbonite

Someone please rescue me! I don’t want to speak Latin!

The first grammar book to state a rule against split infinitives was A Plea for the Queen’s English, published in 1863 by Dean Henry Alford. Alford objected to split infinitives as follows:

“A correspondent states as his own usage, and defends, the insertion of an adverb between the sign of the infinitive mood and the verb. But surely this is a practice entirely unknown to English speakers and writers […] there seems to be no good reason for flying in the face of common usage.” [2]

If it was “entirely unknown” to use split infinitives, when why would the correspondent be writing about it? In reality, people used split infinitives all the time. So what was going on here?

Some historians believe that the standardization of grammar was an attempt to maintain distinctions between social classes. The elite established rules based on their ideas of what “good English” should be—ideas that often ignored common usage.

A concern with status and language is reflected in the other main source for the split infinitive rule. “P” sent this anonymous letter to the editor of the New England Magazine in 1834:

“The practice of separating the prefix of the infinitive mood from the verb, by the intervention of an adverb, is not unfrequent among uneducated persons […] This fault is not often found in print, except in newspapers where the editors have not had the advantage of a good education.” [3]

Ouch! This doesn’t sound like someone I would like to have dinner with.

What did I learn from my investigation? That English teachers believe split infinitives are incorrect because a handful of people in the 1800s didn’t like them. People like “P” felt that split infinitives were not “good English.”

Luckily, we’re more enlightened these days. We don’t make fun of people for failing to understand an arbitrary set of writing rules. We don’t call them uneducated or ignorant. Right?

Wrong.

Time to boldly rescue Han from Jabba’s Palace and get him back into action. He needs to help those “primitive” Ewoks fight off the Imperial stormtroopers.

Even Darth Vader Wasn’t All Bad

It’s not only the split infinitive “rule” that is questionable. A lot of writing concerns commonly presented as rules are more like myths. Just ask Grammar Girl. This can make the writing process confusing. How do you know if something you’ve written is good or bad? Where should you turn?

If you are a staunch prescriptivist, then you turn to resources that describe “normal” usage and follow whatever is considered to be “proper” or “correct.” You attempt to follow a single standard.

If you are a die-hard descriptivist, then you look at how people use language in the real world over time and follow whatever they are doing. You accept that different communities have different approaches to language and that there is no single standard for “good English.”

Most of us are somewhere in the middle. I may like split infinitives, but I cringe whenever I read a billboard with a misplaced apostrophe. I sometimes start a sentence with “and” or “but,” but I have difficulty with the word “ain’t,” even though I know it is acceptable in many contexts.

I remember feeling uncertain when others pointed out my ignorance of writing standards. I have looked at my writing and seen nothing but flaws. It’s a terrible feeling. And yet I have complained about the “bad writing” I’ve encountered in newspapers and mail flyers. Shame on me.

So here is my New Year’s resolution:

I need to remember that writing is an act of courage that should always be celebrated. All writing is on its way to becoming. The path is messy and hard. Writers feel like they’re confronting Darth Vader in a desperate attempt to win the day. We should always support their fight.

The act of criticism is like using the Force – it is neither good nor bad. We can be like the Sith, and act out of anger, fear, and hate. Or we can be Jedi, and remember compassion.

Life isn’t black and white. Luke insisted that there was good in Darth Vader—that the fearsome dark warrior could not be entirely bad. And in the end, Luke was right.

Darth Vader

It was a difficult decision, but he made the right choice…

As you struggle through your writing, or read someone else’s difficult attempt to communicate with the world, please remember:

There is no such thing as bad writing.

Let us be kind to one another. And may the Force be with us.

***

Do you feel like you are more of a prescriptivist or a descriptivist? How do you keep things positive when dealing with difficulties in writing? How do you handle negative criticism of your work?

[1] R.W. Burchfield, The New Fowler’s Modern English Usage, Revised Third Edition (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1998), 736-737.

[2] Wallace Rice, “The Split Infinitive,” The English Journal 26.3 (March 1937): 238-240.

[3] Moisés D. Perales-Escudero, “To Split or Not to Split: The Split Infinitive Past and Present,” Journal of English Linguistics 39.4 (2011): 318.

First image from Star Wars; other images from Return of the Jedi

“Night of the Apostrophe Ninja” Published in The Ghouls’ Review

Sue Archer 17 Comments

Hi everyone,

My story “Night of the Apostrophe Ninja” has just been published in the Grammar Corner column of the inaugural edition of The Ghouls’ Review. Editor-in-Chief Suzanne Purkis (from the excellent blog Apoplectic Apostrophes) has brought together a fantastic collection of fiction and creative non-fiction. I encourage you to check it out!

komori ninja

Image Credit: Komori by Gary Dupuis. Stock art purchased from http://www.rpgnow.com

 

Universal Translator: Noun

Sue Archer 23 Comments

Noun. A part of speech that caters to the human obsession with naming objects. Loosely identified by a primitive human song as “a person, place, or thing.”

(Side note: A formal protest has been lodged with the Galactic Council against human identification of other intelligent beings as “things” and not “persons.” Judgment is still pending.)

Types of Nouns. Humans like to categorize things, and have divided the simple noun into several unnecessary types.

Concrete Noun: An object, substance, or being that can be perceived using the senses (hut, dirt, sword). Humans rely mainly on their eyes, but can also sense things through their ears, mouth, nose, and skin. As their empathic sense is virtually non-existent, they do not consider emotions to be concrete nouns. (See: Abstract Noun.)

Abstract Noun: A thing that can only be understood by the mind, such as a concept (ignorance), a quality (ugly), or a measure (year). Some have expressed surprise that humans are capable of abstract thought. Evidence supports that they are capable, but illogical measurements such as the cubit prove that humans have not evolved competence in this area.

Countable Noun: Something that can be counted. Humans enjoy the repetitive action of counting items such as coins. (As proof, they produce physical tokens of money, even though these tokens are universally obsolete among all higher beings.) English-speaking humans assign a special importance to these nouns by adding an “s” to a countable noun when there is more than one, such as one dollar and two dollars. They also compare the amounts of countable nouns by saying things like, “You have fewer dollars than I have.”

The Money Changer and His Wife

An example in human art of their foolish focus on coin counting

Non-Countable Noun: Something feared and avoided by humans, since it cannot be counted and assigned the special “s” at the end of the noun. Examples include pollution and salt. Comparing amounts of non-countable nouns is handled by saying things like, “My meal has less salt than yours, and so I will live longer.”

Collective Noun: A noun that represents more than one person or thing, such as a flock of humans or a chorus of vehicles. These nouns confuse humans because they are usually treated as singular even though they refer to more than one item.

Common Noun: A noun that has no specific importance, and is not capitalized. Almost all nouns are common nouns.

Proper Noun: A noun that humans have decided is special, and warrants a capital letter at the beginning of the word. Examples include the name of a specific person or place. Humans continue to debate whether the name of their planet should start with a capital letter. Galactic grammarians are also divided on this point. Some argue that Earth should be capitalized, since it is a specific planet. Others argue that a backwater planet named after something as common as dirt has no importance.

Entry submitted by The Learned Dresgjas Sjart-Iiih of the planet Jassssh

(Editor’s Note: Clearly biased against humans. Find someone with more experience of Earth for future entries.)

***

Image credit: Wikipedia Commons, The Money Changer and His Wife

This is the first in my new series called Universal Translator. As some of you may have noticed, I was channeling The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy when I wrote this. 🙂 This series will feature entries from different beings around the universe, who will bring their unique perspectives to the study of the English language. As always, your thoughts and comments are welcome!

DBW Review: Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing

Sue Archer 13 Comments

Welcome to my first DBW Review! In this series, I will share some of the resources that have helped me develop my communication skills.

Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better WritingI’ve talked about Grammar Girl in some of my previous posts. Her real name is Mignon Fogarty, and she started out producing short podcasts to help people understand language rules. She has a website called Quick and Dirty Tips, where she posts her podcasts as articles. Her site is one of my go-to sources for grammar information, and so I decided to pick up a book she wrote called Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing.

What I Liked

Fogarty’s writing style is consistent with her podcast voice: friendly, fun, and knowledgeable. She shares her tips on various grammar and writing challenges in an approachable way and never talks down to her audience.

Pronouns are words that stand in for nouns. They’re pros, like stuntmen. When Aardvark, Squiggly, and Grammar Girl are feeling overworked, they call in a pronoun. Because pronouns don’t get the same recognition as the big stars, they’re a little temperamental. It’s their way of getting even. (139)

She includes a broad range of topics in her book, from common grammar and usage issues to advice on writing style. My favourite section is called “Punch Up Your Punctuation,” where she goes through all of the essential elements of punctuation in detail. (In keeping with Grammar Girl style, the sections are named things like “Comma Comma Comma Comma Comma Chameleon” and “The Question Mark: Huh?”)

Fogarty uses a lot of great examples to illustrate her tips. Two cartoon characters called Aardvark and Squiggly entertain us with their antics while helping us learn. There is also a fantastic appendix called “Quick and Dirty Grammar at a Glance,” which summarizes the most important tips in five pages. (The book has other useful appendices as well, like lists of irregular verbs and subordinating conjunctions.)

What Could Be Better

I attempted to read this book from front to back, and got overwhelmed at the beginning with the large first chapter on usage (called “Dirty Words”). This chapter includes many small sections on word confusions like your vs. you’re and affect vs. effect. The later chapters on topics like capitalization and pronouns are more coherently presented and can be read straight through. I think the usage section is useful to consult when you need it, but it’s not something you are going to want to read like a chapter book.

The book is designed to cover many topics quickly, at a level that works for most audiences. One thing I missed was the in-depth background information that Grammar Girl provides in her podcasts. If you’re looking for a detailed explanation of why a certain rule exists, you won’t find it here. For that level of information, I would encourage you to go to her website. (She is also on Twitter as GrammarGirl.)

Sci-Fi/Fantasy Connection

Since this is Doorway Between Worlds, after all, I kept an eye out for any sci-fi or fantasy fun. Fogarty tells us on page 57 that she is a Star Trek fan. (She uses this show in some of her examples.) For those of you who may be wondering: her favourite series is Star Trek: The Next Generation, followed by Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Verdict

Grammar Girl was one of my big inspirations for starting my own blog, and I’m happy to see that her focus on fun in education is alive and well in this book. Whether you are a novice at grammar or an experienced writer who is struggling with a specific usage issue, this book has something for you. It’s a great summary resource of writing tips.

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Disclosure: I am not being compensated in any way for this review. Just in case you were wondering. 🙂

DBW Reviews is a new post series, and I welcome your feedback on whether this review was helpful for you. Please feel free to comment below. And if you have other great writing or grammar resources you’d like to share, please do!

The Time Traveller’s Verbs, Part 3: To Save Our Future

Sue Archer 9 Comments

In Part 2 of The Time Traveller’s Verbs, the Captain and Sergeant Joe explained past tense verbs to Kevin, Mia, and little Zifnat, with some help from Isaac Newton and Leonardo da Vinci. (If you missed the first installment and would like to read from the beginning, you can find Part 1 here.) With little Zifnat now tucked into bed, Kevin and Mia are ready to hear about the future.

The Captain focused her steady gaze on Kevin and Mia. “What we’re about to tell you is something that you cannot share with anyone else. We think you’re old enough to hear this, but you have to understand that the future is not something you can take lightly. Do you swear to tell no one about what you hear tonight, recruits?”

“We swear,” said Mia. Kevin nodded.

“Well, then,” said the Captain. “If the time traveller’s verbs are important, then the future tense is the most important of all. Anything that we do in the past or the present can change the future. Some changes are small, and don’t affect much of anything. But other changes result in a significant shift in the timeline. Most of the time, our job is to prevent these shifts from happening.”

“But sometimes,” said Joe, “our job is to deliberately shift the timeline. Which is what we’ve been doing tonight.”

“To explain all this, we’re going to use the four future verb tenses: simple, continuous, perfect, and perfect continuous,” said the Captain. “This time, I want you to tell me what tenses I am using. Let’s see how well you’ve learned your verb lessons.”

Simple Future

“I’ve seen many different timelines over the years,” said the Captain. “But no matter what changes, there is one event that has always remained the same.

“Several years from now, an alien race called the Kcchx will attack the Earth and will attempt to destroy us.”

Mia made a squeaking noise. Kevin’s eyes widened.

“Kevin,” said Joe, “what tense was the Captain using?”

Kevin stared at Joe. “You want me to think about verb tenses after hearing that? Are you crazy?”

“Kevin!” snapped the Captain. “Show some respect. And have some faith. The story’s not over yet, boy.”

Kevin narrowed his eyes. “It’s the simple future – you’re using will with the base form of an action verb. Duh. Not that it matters, since we’re all going to die.”

“Of course it matters,” said the Captain. “You weren’t paying attention to what I said.”

“You said that they will attempt to destroy us,” said Mia. “Not that they are going to destroy us.”

“Exactly. Those statements are both expressed in the simple future tense, but I use are going to only for definite events. And for a time traveller, the future is never definite.”

“The Captain and I and our fellow time travellers have been working hard to ensure that the Kcchx will not succeed,” said Joe. “We’ve been observing great moments in history, and trying to make small changes in how the human race has approached science and technology. To change the future, we needed to meet the Zardonians before the Kcchx started to arrive. And now we have met them.”

“Of course we have,” said Kevin. “The Zardonians have always been around!”

“Not quite,” said the Captain. “But you wouldn’t remember any differently. When the timeline changes, your memory does, too.”

“Cool,” said Mia.

Future Continuous

“Here’s another sentence for you,” said the Captain. “Joe and I will be continuing to make sure that a bad future doesn’t happen. Mia, I’m sure you can spot the tense on this one.”

“That’s easy, Captain. It’s the future continuous tense, which you use to talk about ongoing events in the future. Or, should I say, continuing events,” said Mia. She laughed. “You gave it away!”

“Oh, so I did,” said the Captain. “I must be getting old.” Mia laughed again. Kevin started to look a bit less grim.

“Joe, why don’t you share our time-travelling brilliance with our recruits here, and teach them their last two verb tenses.”

“My pleasure,” said Joe.

Future Perfect

“Now that we’ve met the Zardonians, we’re in great shape for the future,” said Joe. “Visiting da Vinci and getting him to think differently about flying machines was the last piece of the puzzle. The rest of our team has been visiting other points in time, and influencing the direction of our technology. So now we have been able to successfully contact the Zardonians. The Zardonians know a lot more about the galaxy than we do. By the time the Kcchx arrive, we will have learned all about them from our Zardonian friends. Do you recognize the tense, Kevin?”

Kevin looked more relaxed. “You’re talking about a future event that will be completed before another event. We’re going to learn about the Kcchx before their arrival. So this must be the future perfect tense!”

“Perfect,” said Joe. “This means we have one more tense left. Mia?”

Future Perfect Continuous

“The future perfect continuous tense,” said Mia. “I think I remember some of this from Mom’s old training program. It said to imagine that you are in the future, looking back on an event that has already started and is still ongoing. You would use this tense to talk about it, with the verbs will have been and an -ing form of an action verb.”

“Wonderful!” said the Captain. “Mia, I am impressed.” Mia beamed.

“By the time the Kcchx are ready to attack us, we will have been working with the Zardonians for many years to improve our capabilities. The Kcchx will be stopped in their tracks,” said Joe.

Space Battle

“So, Earth is safe?” asked Kevin.

“Yes, Earth is safe,” said the Captain. “Joe and I have seen the new future, and humans are doing well.”

“What happens to Kevin and me?” asked Mia. “I know we’re not supposed to ask, but…”

“We can’t tell you that,” said Joe. “But we can tell you that you will make us proud.” Kevin and Mia looked at each other and smiled.

“All right, it’s time for bed for you two. Your lesson is over,” said the Captain. “Joe and I are going to sit out here for a bit before we turn in. Sleep well, recruits.”

With a chorus of goodnights, the two of them left for their portable sleeping cubicles.

The Captain and Sergeant Joe sat next to the campfire in silence for a while. Joe toasted two of the Zardonian berrymallows and offered one to the Captain. She shook her head. Joe ate one and winced. “I guess not everything is better,” he observed.

The Captain sighed and shifted her weight on the anti-grav platform. “You’d think they could have come up with more comfortable chairs. I’m getting tired of this, Joe.”

“Maybe it’s time for you to retire, Captain,” said Joe.

The Captain gave him a look.

“No disrespect intended,” said Joe, and saluted.

The Captain turned back to stare at the dying fire. “I will someday, Joe. But not until I am sure that those youngsters will be safe. You know how easy it is for things to change.”

Joe’s pocket beeped. He pulled out his comm unit and looked at the screen. “Speak of the devil,” he said. “It looks like our favourite King Richard is acting up again.”

“Gah! Not that pompous windbag. Please tell me we’re not going to war.” The Captain and Joe stood up and walked into the darkness.

“Oh, but I know how much you love using a sword,” teased Joe.

“You’d better be careful or I’ll show you how well I can use it, Sergeant. I’m not that old yet.”

Their voices faded away.

There was a flash of blue light, and something changed…

***

So ends the tale of The Time Traveller’s Verbs. Thanks for reading my epic verb saga. Looking for more fun with verbs? See my previous posts about verb moods and action vs. linking verbs.

My son, the master artist, provided the picture for today’s story. I think I owe him an ice cream now. 🙂

The Time Traveller’s Verbs, Part 2: How We Changed the Past

Sue Archer 13 Comments

In Part 1 of The Time Traveller’s Verbs, we met time travellers Captain and Sergeant Joe around a summer campfire. They explained present tense verbs to Kevin, Mia, and little Charlie, and then left abruptly on a new mission to the past.

There was a flash of blue light. A few seconds later, the Captain and Sergeant Joe walked up to the campfire. The Captain looked triumphant. Joe looked like he had been dragged backward through a hedge. His pants were ripped at the knees and his face was smudged with dirt.

“Now,” said the Captain cheerfully, “where were we?”

Mia looked at Joe, and then back at the Captain. “Well,” she said hesitantly, “I think we were just talking about verbs, but I’m not sure I remember everything…”

“What happened to you, Joe?” asked Kevin. “I don’t think you had all that dirt on your face when we were talking…or did you?” He shook his head as if to clear it.

Joe raised his eyebrows at the Captain. She shrugged. “We just returned from a mission to the past. Would you like to hear about it?”

“Yes, please!” said little Zifnat.

The Captain and Joe examined the anti-grav hover platform that now circled the fire, and carefully seated themselves on it.

“It’s good to hear such enthusiasm from you, Charlie,” said the Captain to little Zifnat.

“You mean Zifnat,” said Joe to the Captain. “You remember Zifnat, don’t you?”

“Of course,” said the Captain briskly. “A good strong Zardonian name. I remember your parents naming you after our Zardonian friends. I must have been thinking of someone else.”

“So,” said Joe, “we went back in time to visit Leonardo da Vinci…”

“Oh, no, Joe,” said the Captain, “I think we should start with Isaac Newton. That’s the most exciting part of the story. And it will give us a great opportunity to teach our recruits here all about past tense verbs.”

“I knew you were going to say that,” muttered Joe.

“Did you really meet Isaac Newton?” asked Kevin skeptically.

“Oh yes,” said the Captain. “Well, sort of. We observed him for a while before we had our discussion with you on present tense verbs. Do all of you remember the four types of verbs we’ve learned so far—simple, continuous, perfect, and perfect continuous?”

“I think so,” said Mia valiantly. It was clear she didn’t quite remember, but didn’t want to admit it.

“Well, the past tense has the same four types, along with a special one called the habitual past. We’ll try to use all of them in our story.

Simple Past

“Let’s begin with the simple past, which uses the past form of an action verb. Joe, why don’t you start us off?”

Joe adopted his best classroom voice. “As you may know, Sir Isaac Newton developed his theory of gravity after he saw an apple fall from a tree.  This happened on a specific day in the year 1666. We travelled to that day to observe how this event came about.”

“You can see why the simple past is used a lot for telling stories. Although they’re usually not as boring as that, Joe!”

“Hey, I tried to use the drama of the simple present tense the last time I told a story, but you said not to,” protested Joe.

Habitual Past

“Anyway,” said the Captain, “the habitual past is also used a lot when telling stories. You use the habitual past to talk about something that occurred regularly in the past. This tense uses the word would along with the base form of the action verb. Like this: ‘Newton would often stroll through his mother’s garden in Lincolnshire, which is where this momentous event occurred.'”

“I think your story is boring, too,” said Kevin. Joe high-fived him.

“There’s just no respect from the young anymore,” mock-frowned the Captain.

“I respect you, Captain!” enthused Mia.

Kevin rolled his eyes.

“Thank you, Recruit Mia,” said the Captain. “Well, the story’s about to get more exciting. Because Joe was hungry. So he ate an apple from the tree in Lincolnshire. Which was a big mistake.”

Joe blushed.

Past Continuous

“What happened?” asked little Zifnat.

“I’ll tell you what happened if you give me an example of the past continuous tense. This tense is used to describe an ongoing event in the past. Sometimes this ongoing event is combined with another event in the sentence—to show how something was in progress when something else happened. You use the past form of the verb to be, such as I was, along with an -ing word, like waiting. Can you think of an example, Zifnat?”

Zifnat stuck his tongue out in thought. “I was…waiting…to find out what happened next…when…a spaceship flew by!” He said this as the purple lights of a Zardonian spaceship blinked by overhead.

“Great job, Zifnat!” said Joe, and low-fived him so that Zifnat could reach him. Zifnat bounced up and down and almost fell off the platform.

“Careful there, youngster,” said the Captain, steadying him. “These things are dangerous. Sometimes I miss the old timeline, even if it had its problems.”

“What do you mean, the old timeline?” asked Kevin.

“Oh, that’s a story for later. So, where were we? Ah, Joe’s mistake. How could I forget?”

Joe glared at her.

“Joe was still eating the apple when Newton came outside to walk through the garden. While Newton was walking through the garden, we were both hiding, waiting for an apple to fall from the tree.”

Past Perfect

“And then what happened?” asked Kevin, drawn in to the story in spite of himself.

“Nothing,” said the Captain. “Because Joe had eaten the gravity apple!”

Bitten Apple

Mia gasped. “No gravity apple?”

“And it gets worse,” said the Captain with relish, while Joe looked away. “Because Joe had eaten the special gravity apple, our time machine disappeared.”

“No way!” said Kevin, while Zifnat shrieked in excitement.

“Yes. Had eaten, by the way, is an example of the past perfect tense. You use the verb had with the past participle of another verb. In this case, I was describing an event that was completed before another event happened.”

“The apple was eaten, and then the time machine disappeared,” said Mia in understanding.

“Exactly. Now, with linking verbs, you can use the past perfect tense to describe a mental or emotional state that was happening when another event occurred. Like, ‘I had known the apple was important, but I was still taken by surprise when our way home went up in smoke.”

“Enough already,” said Joe. “I fixed the situation, didn’t I?” He gestured at his ripped pants.

“Yes. After Newton went back inside, Joe climbed up the tree and started throwing apples until Newton noticed one falling when he looked out the window. It didn’t fall straight down, though, so it did affect his theory of gravity slightly. But we got our time machine back, even if it did have a different design.”

“We’d expected there would be other changes in the present,” said Joe. “And there were. We saw that when we were talking to you about present tense verbs.”

“There were too many changes, unfortunately,” said the Captain. “So we went back in time to fly by Leonardo da Vinci’s house.”

“What do you mean, too many changes?” asked Kevin.

“We’ll get to those when we talk about the future, I promise. For now, I have one more past verb tense for all of you. Mia, do you know what it might be?”

“The past perfect continuous?” asked Mia.

“Yes, Mia. You will make an excellent time traveller,” said the Captain.

Past Perfect Continuous

“For the past perfect continuous tense,” said Joe, “you use the verb had with been and the -ing form of an action verb. This tense shows how an event in the past was still ongoing when another event occurred. Like this: ‘We had been flying our time machine back and forth a few times when da Vinci finally came out and saw us.'”

“Isn’t it a bad idea to have people in the past see you?” asked Kevin.

“Normally, yes,” said the Captain. “Nice verb explanation, Joe. You do listen to me after all.”

Joe half-smiled and saluted her.

“I don’t get it,” said Mia. “I thought hiding from people was an unbreakable rule for a time traveller.”

“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” said the Captain. “We needed da Vinci to change his drawings of mechanical flying machines based on what he saw. Because we needed to change our future.”

“Whoa,” said Kevin. Zifnat yawned and rubbed his eyes.

“Mia, Kevin, why don’t you tuck Zifnat into his portable sleeping cubicle,” said Joe. “Then we can tell the two of you about the future.”

“Wanna hear…’bout…futr…” sighed Zifnat sleepily, as Kevin picked him up and carried him to bed. Mia hurried after him, not wanting to miss the story.

“Thanks for catching that Charlie was Zifnat, Joe,” said the Captain quietly. “It’s taking me longer these days to sync up the timelines in my head. It’s so frustrating.”

“Of course, Captain,” said Joe, eyeing her with concern. “Do you think Kevin and Mia are ready to hear about the future?”

“Yes,” said the Captain. “After all, it will be their future. And they’ll be taking over from us soon.”

“At least now they’ll have hope,” said Joe.

They stared into the flames, waiting.

***

Tune in next week for the final installment of The Time Traveller’s Verbs, when we will save the future of humanity!

This series of posts is dedicated to Shelley Sackier, blogger extraordinaire, who asked me to write about perfect and continuous verbs.

My son graciously agreed to contribute another picture to today’s story. 🙂