# future in the past - una pozione che l'avrebbe fatta dormire



## gi*

Ciao,I have to write about the tragedy Romeo and Juliet. I have a problem about English grammarc: I don't know how can I write in English "the future in the past". I know that it sounds a bit strange..I hope you'll understand!! 
I have to translate something like: Le dette una "pozione" che L'AVREBBE FATTA DORMIRE due giorni... = He gave her a ???? which ????? for two days..
                giulia


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## usa_scott

"He gave her a potion which made her sleep for two days."


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## usa_scott

"He gave her a potion which will make her sleep for two days"

This is a bit ungainly. It means that the potion has already been given but she has not yet fallen asleep.

 "he gave her a potion which would make her sleep for two days"

We really wouldn't say it in this way. Its OK, but not ideal.

"He gave her a potion which made her sleep for two days"

This "sounds" better is the least convoluted of all of the above.


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## fran06

usa_scott said:
			
		

> "he gave her a potion which would* eventually *make her sleep for two days"
> 
> We really wouldn't say it in this way.


 
Would you say it like this?


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## usa_scott

Originally Posted by *usa_scott*
_ 
"he gave her a potion which would* eventually *make her sleep for two days"

We really wouldn't say it in this way._




			
				fran06 said:
			
		

> Would you say it like this?


Only if it is a very slow-acting potion or if the potion is made to activate at a time significantly later than the time at which it is swallowed. This could even imply that the potion would make her sleep some number of days/weeks/months or even years later.


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## usa_scott

You could use "He gave her a potion which would put her to sleep for two days".

But again, this indicates that there is at least a bit of time between swallowing the potion and falling asleep.


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## uinni

usa_scott said:
			
		

> "He gave her a potion which made her sleep for two days"


This actually translates:
"Le dette una pozione che la *fece* dormire per due giorni".
Yet the requested translation is about "*l'avrebbe fatta*", which indeed requires the future in the past.

Uinni


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## usa_scott

You could introduce another nuance such as "He decided to give...".

This would alleviate the time lag between swallowing and sleeping.


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## uinni

usa_scott said:
			
		

> You could use "He gave her a potion which would put her to sleep for two days".
> 
> But again, this indicates that there is at least a bit of time between swallowing the potion and falling asleep.


 
And in fact this is the meaning of "l'avrebbe fatta" (future in the past"!).

Uinni


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## usa_scott

If you must have this "future in the past" then my suggestion would be "He decided to give a potion which would put her to sleep for two days" or "He planned to..." or the like.


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## bartonig

In my experience of performances of the play she takes the potion and falls asleep. The following are possible:

_He gave her a potion which made her sleep for two days._
_He gave her a potion to put her to sleep for two days._

The use of _would_ to construct the future in the past implies a delay between the taking and the falling asleep. _Would_ could be used to express the conditional relationship between her sleeping and his decision:

_He was thinking about giving her a potion which would make her sleep for two days._


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## uinni

bartonig said:
			
		

> In my experience of performances of the play she takes the potion and falls asleep. The following are possible:
> 
> _He gave her a potion which made her sleep for two days. =_ *Le dette una pozione che la fece dormire per due giorni*
> _He gave her a potion to put her to sleep for two days =_ *Le dette una pozione per farla dormire per due giorni*
> 
> The use of _would_ to construct the future in the past implies a delay between the taking and the falling asleep. _Would_ could be used to express the conditional relationship between her sleeping and his decision:
> 
> _He was thinking about giving her a potion which would make her sleep for two days._


 

It's amazing how this (English) future in the past is disliked by anglosaxon foreros.
So to understand this mystery (why putting forth all this "he was thinking/planning and so on and so on) I ask the connected anglosaxons to tell me what they think about the following sentences.

- Giuseppe informed me that the airplane to Paris would leave an hour later = Giuseppe mi comunicò che l'aereo da Parigi sarebbe decollato un'ora più tardi [mere future action]
- Giuseppe informed me that he was leaving to Paris an hour later = Giuseppe mi comunicò che sarebbe partito per Parigi un'ora più tardi [future planning]
- Giuseppe informed me that he was going to leave to Paris after an hour= Giuseppe mi comunicò che intendeva partire un'ora dopo [intention].

Uinni


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## bartonig

_He gave her a potion to make it look as if she was / were dead for two days._

Or (I've just thought of a sentence using would. However, this is a bit of past habit combined with the future in the past)

_He gave her a potion so that she would appear to be dead for two days._


The _were _word is _be_ in the past tense and subjunctive mood which some people prefer to use over was. Others are content with _was_.

The form of my sentences and the vocabulary I have used might not be appropriate for the text you are producing.


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## usa_scott

Since potions (in general) are not intrinsically bad, the malevolent nature of this particular offering should be clarified:

"He gave her a _*poisoned*_ potion..."

Otherwise, giving her a potion to induce sleep seems to indicate that potions in general are used in such a way.

After all, the witch didn't just give Sleeping Beauty an apple. She gave her a _poisoned_ apple.

I would also use something like "...to induce a death-like sleep for two days..."


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## brian

fran06 said:
			
		

> Would you say it like this?


 Yes.

_He gave her a potion which will make her fall asleep = He has already given her a potion but she is currently not yet asleep

He gave her a potion which made her fall asleep = He has already given her a potion and she has already fallen asleep (probably, but not always, just after the adminstering of the potion)

He gave her a potion which would make her fall asleep = He has already given her a potion, and in the present time that I am telling you this, she has already fallen asleep, yet in the context of my storytelling you, she may or may not have fallen asleep yet._

Let me elaborate.  If I am narrating the Romeo & Juliet story and I want to tell you some events that happened _in between_ the time he gave her the potion and the time that she fell asleep, I would say _He gave her a potion which would make her fall asleep:

He gave her a potion which would (eventually ) make her fall asleep.  In the meantime, such and such happened, etc etc etc etc.  Later on, she fell asleep._

If I'm not going to include any extra narration in between the adminstering of the potion and the falling asleep, I would just say:

_He gave her a potion that made her fall asleep. [end of event, now moving on...] Then such and such, etc. etc,..._

I should also add that the sentence _He gave her a potion which would make her fall asleep_ adds a small hint of "intent" as well as the possibility of failure.  So one could write: _He gave her a potion which would (with which he intended to) make her fall asleep, but soon after drinking it, she found an antidote to stay awake!_

Hope this helps.


Brian


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## brian

I hope I explained the English differences well enough.  And this may be of some help going from Italian to English or vice versa.


Brian


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## moodywop

brian8733 said:
			
		

> If I am narrating the Romeo & Juliet story


 
I've just realized what sounded odd to me about the examples. Don't you normally use the present tense when describing the plot of a play/novel etc (as opposed to when you're telling a child a fairy story)? You would say _Hamlet confronts Gertrude and tells her that..., _wouldn't you? (rather than _Hamlet confronted...)_


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## usa_scott

moodywop said:
			
		

> I've just realized what sounded odd to me about the examples. Don't you normally use the present tense when describing the plot of a play/novel etc (as opposed to when you're telling a child a fairy story)? You would say _Hamlet confronts Gertrude and tells her that..., _wouldn't you? (rather than _Hamlet confronted...)_


Point well-made. If you're a narrator, yes, likely. If you're merely a "storyteller" then either way would be OK.


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## brian

moodywop said:
			
		

> I've just realized what sounded odd to me about the examples. Don't you normally use the present tense when describing the plot of a play/novel etc (as opposed to when you're telling a child a fairy story)? You would say _Hamlet confronts Gertrude and tells her that..., _wouldn't you? (rather than _Hamlet confronted...)_


Yes, that's a good point, _especially_ when writing a paper/report should you _always_ speak in present tense about the play/novel.  But now the "would" plot thickens...

Referring to my previous post, if you want to have the sense that the action of giving the potion as well as the effects of the potion are both completed, you say:

_He gives her a potion that makes her fall asleep._

If you want to have the sense that the action of giving the potion is completed but the effects are either not yet begun or not yet completed, you say:

_He gives her a potion to make her fall asleep.  In the meantime, such and such happens, etc. etc.  Then she falls asleep.

_Here, I use "to make" as I had described in my previous post--it has the idea of "intent."  _To make = in order to make = for the purpose of making = with the intention of making_.

You could also have a scenario in which he gives her a potion but she has not drunk it yet (and thus the effects are not yet begun).  The above sentence with "to make" could imply this, or you could say:

_He gives her a potion that will (whenever she should drink it) make her fall asleep._

I would not read this sentence as if he gives her the potion, she drinks it, but the effects are not begun/completed.  Instead, I read this as if she has not drunk it yet.  Others may disagree.

To complicate matters a bit further, these sentences only make sense with the article _a_ preceding _potion_.  You could also have:

_He gives her the potion that would make her fall asleep_, implying _He gives her the one potion (the very potion she needs) that is capable of making her fall asleep...no other potions work.

_Now, with this in mind, if I said _He gives her a potion that would make her fall asleep,_ I mean that _He gives her a potion from a number of possible potions capable of making her fall asleep._

The difference I see when using "would" is that it's more of a favor...as if she goes to him asking which potion(s) would make her fall asleep, and he gives her the potion, or a potion, capable of doing so.  There is no "intent" on his part to make her fall asleep...it is her intent.  And the difference between a and the is how many potions are capable of doing the job.

And to conclude, I should mention that in book-report writing, you would generally not see the following:

_He gives her a potion that made her fall asleep. _[rather nonsensical, but again, changing _a_ to _the _gives _He gives her the potion that made her fall asleep,_ meaning _He presently gives her the one potion that, in the past [already completed], made her fall asleep, but now she is awake again to receive it._]

_He gives her a potion that may/might make her fall asleep._ [this tries to impart some uncertainty upon the person giving the potion, i.e. his uncertainty as to whether or not the potion will work...but one should say instead, _He gives her a potion that he thinks will make her fall asleep_]

_He gives her a potion that should make her fall asleep._ [tries to do the above, but is nonsense, too...use "he thinks should"]

Finally, you can have the usual conditional: _He gives her a potion that would have made her fall asleep, if she had not found an antidote._

I think those are all the cases, and I apologize if I provided too many unnecessary examples in the (somewhat vane) attempt to be thorough. 


Brian


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## lsp

When I read "Le dette una 'pozione' che L'AVREBBE FATTA DORMIRE due giorni" I spontaneously thought "he gave her a potion which would make her sleep for two days" or "he gave her a potion to make her sleep for two days."


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## Andysi

uinni said:
			
		

> It's amazing how this (English) future in the past is disliked by anglosaxon foreros.
> 
> Not disliked - there is simply not a clearly defined tense for it in English apart from the construction using "would". By the way I understood l'avrebbe fatta dormire as being in the perfect conditional tense - in other words it should legalistically be translated would have put her to sleep.
> 
> I believe the historical evolution of English "will" causes some confusion. Both "would" and "could" have conditional and non-conditional meanings. In describing a past event they both take on non conditional meanings unless you say could have or would have, in which case they remain conditional. that would put her to sleep is therefore non-conditional and is the future in the past, as required in this case. Shakespeare would have gone to Hawaii is conditional perfect, expressing his unfulfilled desire. So I am wondering why l'avrebbe fatta dormire was used in this Italian text of Romeo and Juliet??
> 
> ******************
> - Giuseppe informed me that the airplane to/for Paris would leave an hour later = Giuseppe mi comunicò che l'aereo da Parigi sarebbe decollato un'ora più tardi [mere future action]
> 
> This is *future in the past*, otherwise you would say will leave an hour later
> 
> - Giuseppe informed me that he was leaving for Paris an hour later = Giuseppe mi comunicò che sarebbe partito per Parigi un'ora più tardi [future planning]
> 
> Either future entirely in the past or it bridges the present ( informed in the past , leaving very soon now). For true future planning you say that he'll be leaving for Paris an hour later (_than now or than some future time point referred to in the conversation_)
> 
> - Giuseppe informed me that he was going to leave for Paris after an hour= Giuseppe mi comunicò che intendeva partire un'ora dopo [intention].
> 
> Corretto
> 
> Uinni


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## moodywop

This structure is extremely confusing for both Italians and foreign learners(even advanced ones) because of the radical differences in tense usage/meaning between the two languages. 

This is confirmed by Andysi's question:




> So I am wondering why l'avrebbe fatta dormire was used in this Italian text of Romeo and Juliet??


Andysi, you may find some answers in the thread mentioned by Brian.

Maybe I can clarify the difference between the two languages thus: in Italian we *cannot* differentiate between _he said he would tell her _and _he said he would have told her_(_if she had not walked out in a huff)_ simply because we *must *use the past conditional (_che glielo avrebbe detto) _in *both *examples.

More examples:

_When he said that he knew full well that his words *would hurt* her deeply_
Here we can only say _*l'avrebbero ferita*_

_I knew you *would say *that_
_Sapevo che *avresti detto *questo_

Now here's an example that shows how our inability to differentiate between _would _and _would have _(present vs past conditional) in the "future in the past" combined with hypothetical statements *in reported* *speech* can lead to ambiguity in Italian where there is none in English:

(Luigi is thinking about the past with regret)
_He thought that if he had married Sara they would have been very happy together_
_Pensò che se l'avesse sposata sarebbero stati molto felici insieme_

In English there is no ambiguity: he didn't marry her. Luigi is just regretting not doing something many years ago. Sara may even be dead.

But the Italian sentence can also mean that Luigi is pondering whether he should marry Sara *now*, i.e. _he was thinking that if he married Sara they would be very happy together_

To avoid ambiguity we would have to add a time phrase to the first sentence: _...che se l'avesse sposata tanti anni fa..._

Now, if this thread had been nipped in the bud as a request for help with homework would we ever have had the opportunity to explore all these nuances?

*EDIT:* To avoid confusion, I'd like to stress that I highlighted *in reported speech *because if we use direct speech then we are free to use the present conditional or the past conditional and differentiate the two meanings:

Luigi pensava: "Se l'avessi sposata saremmo stati molto felici insieme"

Luigi pensava: "Se la sposassi saremmo molto felici insieme"

It is only when *reporting *speech/thoughts/hopes etc that we cannot use the present conditional in Italian


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## Andysi

moodywop said:
			
		

> Maybe I can clarify the difference between the two languages thus: in Italian we *cannot* differentiate between _he said he would tell her _and _he said he would have told her_(_if she had not walked out in a huff)_ simply because we *must *use the past conditional (_che glielo avrebbe detto) _in *both *examples.
> 
> Va bene - capisco - alla fine!
> I am glad to have this explained as I was really worried about it!
> 
> 
> Now here's an example that shows how our inability to differentiate between _would _and _would have _(present vs past conditional) in the "future in the past" combined with hypothetical statements *in reported* *speech* can lead to ambiguity in Italian where there is none in English:
> 
> (Luigi is thinking about the past with regret)
> _He thought that if he had married Sara they would have been very happy together_
> _Pensò che se l'avesse sposata sarebbero stati molto felici insieme_
> 
> In English there is no ambiguity: he didn't marry her. Luigi is just regretting not doing something many years ago. Sara may even be dead.
> 
> But the Italian sentence can also mean that Luigi is pondering whether he should marry Sara *now*, i.e. _he was thinking that if he married Sara they would be very happy together_
> 
> To avoid ambiguity we would have to add a time phrase to the first sentence: _...che se l'avesse sposata tanti anni fa..._
> 
> Now, if this thread had been nipped in the bud as a request for help with homework would we ever have had the opportunity to explore all these nuances?
> 
> *EDIT:* To avoid confusion, I'd like to stress that I highlighted *in reported speech *because if we use direct speech then we are free to use the present conditional or the past conditional and differentiate the two meanings:
> 
> Luigi pensava: "Se l'avessi sposata saremmo stati molto felici insieme"
> 
> Luigi pensava: "Se la sposassi saremmo molto felici insieme"


 
Whew!!!

What a great informative reply. You told me everything I needed to know. In fact I just now found examples of the latter two examples (given above) in my Grammar book Soluzioni! where the subjunctive is used with the conditional after "se". Thanks so much!


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## moodywop

I, too, still have doubts about the "future in the past". _Practical English Usage_ claims that there is sometimes no difference between using _would _vs _would have _in reported speech_ :_

Direct: _If I had any money I'd buy you a drink_

Indirect: _She said if she had had any money she would have bought me a drink _*or *_she said if she had any money she would buy..._

If the two indirect sentences are indeed interchangeable, as the usage guide states unequivocally, then my previous Luigi/Sara examples are wrong.

Any input?


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## lsp

moodywop said:
			
		

> Direct: _If I had any money I'd buy you a drink_
> 
> Indirect: _She said if she had had any money she would have bought me a drink _*or *_she said if she had any money she would buy..._
> 
> If the two indirect sentences are indeed interchangeable, as the usage guide states unequivocally, then my previous Luigi/Sara examples are wrong.
> 
> Any input?


Not interchangeable to me. 
1. I hear, "She said if she had had any money she would have bought me a drink," and I think, *but she didn't have money so she didn't buy me a drink.*
2. I hear, "She said if she had any money she would buy me a drink," and I think, *and when I see her she'll let me know if she does have money and can buy me a drink.
*


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## Andysi

Hi there Moodywop!
 
You raised some valid and interesting points about equivalence of present and past forms of conditional statements in Italian. I take it that having said that the past conditional in Italian is ambiguous, you suggest (from referring to Practical English Usage) that the same may be true for English as well (in reported speech).
 
I’ve thought about this over the last few hours and have come to realise that language is really so complex and defies easy categorisation! Anyway, my opinion on the issue you raised would be both yes and no – it depends.
 
I do agree with the slant given by Isp re “when we meet”. It does depend on the time frame the speaker is referring to. But to take the simplest case, for your example, “she said if she had any money she would buy me a drink” this is true. There is in effect no real difference for reported speech. This happens because of the word “said”, which “compresses” the past retrospectively. When using direct speech there is a difference because one is dealing with the moment of thought (I would buy you a drink – it’s open ended) and the other with a moment just completed or resolved (I would have bought you a drink – it’s now closed). In reported speech the distinction between the two blurs due to both being in the past and therefore now closed.
 
For either direct or reported speech you can even use a hybrid form– “She said if she had any money she would have bought me a drink.” If the hybrid is used it is also equivalent to the standard reported form.
*If I had* any money I would have bought = *If I’d had* any money I would have bought
 
I believe this equivalence is due to the dependent conditional clause dominating the sentence, whereas the independent subjunctive clause (If I had) is vague or more freeform. I’m not an English guru, but I suggest this might have occurred due to a drift in expressing subjunctive mood. Although a subjunctive conjugation has almost vanished in English now, the mood itself still exists, but it represented by several forms viz.
If I had = Had I = Were I to have (present subjunctive)
 
If I’d had = Had I had = Were I to have had (past subjunctive)
 
*If I’d had* (past subjunctive) can be substituted with *If I had* (present subjunctive) if the former is being used to describe a very recent past moment in time (eg the party is breaking up and the participants are about to leave or have just left the pub). Not enough time has elapsed for the condition of “not having enough money” to have changed, so the present subjunctive is applied to the just completed past as well. However later, when a longer time has elapsed it is better to say *If I’d had* because the status of my cash-in-hand may well be different.
 
Now consider the following sentences,
 
1. She eyed the journalist across the table and thought blithely that if *she had* the money she *would buy* him a drink.
 
2. She eyed the journalist across the table and thought blithely that if *she’d had* the money she *would have bought* him a drink.
 
Although this example is similar to the one above the two sentences convey a subtle but distinct difference in meaning. This is because it is not reported speech, but 3rd person narrative. There is a greater sense of immediacy here, as if we are in the mind of the woman, and so the open-ended vs. closed distinction is preserved, just as in direct speech.
 
Now I’ll just add one more comment to the Romeo/Juliet discussion, then I’ll stop! The sentence “He gave her a potion that would put her to sleep” is different from the examples above because the qualifying clause is not conditional and the main clause is not subjunctive. There is a definite cause and effect with no doubt involved. So in this case the adjectival clause *that would put her to sleep* is purely future in the past. It is interesting to me that Italian uses the conditional form for this. Thanks again for pointing that out.
 
Andy


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## Auno

This is impeccable on every count Andy - knowledge, reasoning, expression, and it's throrough (maybe a bit more on the earlier *now* point, to have been clear).  Very impressive.  It even caused me to print off and think over.  

For a while there, it seemed as if _Romeo and Juliet_ might be in grave danger of confusion with _Much Ado About Nothing. _

As a small addition, this is also relevant.  It crept in over the course of the thread, unremarked - 

http://www.bartleby.com/64/C001/062.html

Moody when you see the present tense being used in the manner you describe, this is largely because it is consistent with DIRECTION - directing the play, etc, in other words.

Uinni whatever impression you may have obtained from the forum here, there is no difficultywith/aversion to the future in the past in English.  Each of your examples are acceptable, although the preposition would be 'for', not 'to' in your latter two.


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## moodywop

Auno said:
			
		

> Moody when you see the present tense being used in the manner you describe, this is largely because it is consistent with DIRECTION - directing the play, etc, in other words.


 
Hi Auno

Your explanation suggests that the present tense is only used in summarizing the storyline of a play or movie. However the tense is also used when describing the plot of a novel or the story in a narrative poem:

_Young Copperfield is sent to school...where he is bullied by the tyrannical headmaster_

_The monster Grendel enters the hall at night and carries off..._

_(Oxford Companion to English Literature)_

So I wouldn't say the use of the present is related to directing (although of course directing instructions also use the present) but rather that it is used whenever a fictional story is being summarized.

By the way, in Italian we often use the present in historical accounts - it makes for a more dramatic effect:

_Il 1° settembre del 1939 Hitler invade la Polonia_

I believe this usage is common in English as well, isn't it?


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## Auno

Hi Moody,

Am about to mail you btw (by the way) - had to do so before the grande partita! (rare Auno exclamation point)

Well yes, fair/good point.  But I'd still say something along this line.  Dickens say, is using this as a 'device', in a not dissimilar vein.

Yes the same does apply sometimes with historical accounts, but again I'd say the same thing - direction of actors in a play.


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## moodywop

Auno said:
			
		

> Well yes, fair/good point. But I'd still say something along this line. Dickens say, is using this as a 'device', in a not dissimilar vein.


 
Auno

You're going to think I'm a hopeless pedant but my quote was not from Dickens - both quotes are from the plot summaries in the _Oxford Companion._


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## Auno

No not at all.  It's a good question.

Sorry to be repetitive, but it's the same in every case - direction-style narrative.  How to put this... it's a way, in English, of 'getting through things'...say quickly, or for other reasons.

Dickens himself does do this here and there, incidentally.


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## moodywop

Quirk, Greenbaum etc agree with you (in _CGEL_):

"A special exception is the use of the present in stage directions...
Here the present is used by convention, as if to represent the idea that the events of the play are being performed before our eyes as we read the script. *A similar convention is used in summaries of narratives"*
_(A Comprehensive_ _Grammar of the English Lanuage, Longman)_

On a different note, it's nice to see that the Aussie contingent at IE has recently grown considerably. Apart from Charles, who has for a long time had to carry the burden of acting as our only AustrE consultant, we now have Giacinta, Gemelle, Auno and Andysi (am I forgetting anyone?).

Could it be the Aussies now outnumber the poms? Still no Kiwis, though.


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## usa_scott

moodywop said:
			
		

> I agree that when the thread-opener submits a text the forer@ should attempt a translation him/herself first - except, of course, when someone openly states "I can't speak Italian at all. Could you please translate this sentence/phrase I intend to use for a tattoo?"
> 
> However in this case Giulia had translated the whole sentence except for the "future in the past" verb, which she clearly had no clue how to render in English.
> 
> A further point to be made is that we are all learners here. The first/second/third etc translation offered has often proved to be incorrect because of L2 interference. This is exactly what happened with usa_scott's translation, which, thanks to the wrong tense he used, paved the way for a fruitful discussion.
> In a way, the more incorrect/misleading translations are submitted the better, since they highlight differences between the two languages (the L2 interference I have to deal with at school every day ) we may not have noticed before or which are not covered in textbooks, even advanced ones (see the "mica" thread, where the translations provided helped me appreciate a nuance in my own language which I had not noticed even after teaching English to Italians and thus constantly comparing the two languages for 15 years).
> 
> I, too, still have doubts about the "future in the past". _Practical English Usage_ claims that there is sometimes no difference between using _would _vs _would have _in reported speech_ :_
> 
> Direct: _If I had any money I'd buy you a drink_
> 
> Indirect: _She said if she had had any money she would have bought me a drink _*or *_she said if she had any money she would buy..._
> 
> If the two indirect sentences are indeed interchangeable, as the usage guide states unequivocally, then my previous Luigi/Sara examples are wrong.
> 
> Any input?



Re. "...with usa_scott's translation, which, thanks to the wrong tense he used..."

Uh... Come again??

If your primary aim is to keep future-in-the-past structure which, in context, serves _*no*_ good purpose whatsoever, then go right ahead. 

If, however, an appropriate way of communicating in English is desirable, you'd want it the way I put it.

(Obviously the latter was/is desired.)

;-)


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## brian

usa_scott said:
			
		

> Re. "...with usa_scott's translation, which, thanks to the wrong tense he used..."
> 
> Uh... Come again??
> 
> If your primary aim is to keep future-in-the-past structure which, in context, serves _*no*_ good purpose whatsoever, then go right ahead.
> 
> If, however, an appropriate way of communicating in English is desirable, you'd want it the way I put it.
> 
> (Obviously the latter was/is desired.)
> 
> ;-)


By "the way I put it," do you mean your translation...



			
				usa_scott said:
			
		

> He gave her a potion which made her sleep for two days


I assume you agree that this is not the correct translation.  Or if you think it is correct, you at least agree that it's not the literal translation, right?  The literal & correct translation would be, "_He gave her a potion which would make her sleep for two days._"  I hope you will agree that this is at least the *literal* translation, especially in light of the native Italians' corroboration.  And to persuade you that it's the correct translation, I refer you to my post #38 to see the differences in meaning among all the possibilities, particularly these two.  And finally, if you agree that the two English translations are in fact different, then you must opt for the literal translation.  Plus, if the Italian were seeking the meaning you propose, why not just say "_...che l'*ha* fatta dormire due giorni_" = _"...which made her sleep for two days_"?


Brian


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