Can you explain me the difference between ...

Question

I know Vanessa would like to have come to your party.andI know Vanessa would have liked to have come to your party.Would be sooooo appreciated if some could help me.

Dj Bueno · Accepted Answer

If you organised a party Vanessa would like to come to your house.(there is no organised party yet)

If you had invited Vanessa she would have liked to come(but you didn't invite)

Natalie89 · Answer

Thank you DJ Bueno very much for explaining it to me.

X11 · Answer

I will have to disagree with DJ Bueno on this one. As I see it, the first sentence is not correct English. I cannot explain it in grammatical terms so if anyone is able to do so, please do.

Jay

Dj Bueno · Answer

No,it is correct..But yes,there is just a little mistake

-->>it should have been " ....Vanessa would like to come to your house" not "Vanessa would like to have come..."

Little Cloud · Answer

Natalie89
1) I know Vanessa would like to have come to your party.

and

2) I know Vanessa would have liked to have come to your party.

I'd say:

I know Vanessa would have like to come to your party (...if u had invited her)

CalifJim · Answer

Let's drop the "I know", as it doesn't enter into the choices available.

1.0 The "liking", i.e., wanting, is in the present. Note that "would" is part of the idiom "would like", which is just a more polite or tentative form of "want", not a sign of a conditional structure.

1.1 The "coming to the party" is at the same time as the wanting, or later. (It is in the present or future.)

V would like to come to the party.

1.2 The "coming to the party" is previous to the time of the wanting. (It is in the past.)

V would like to have come to the party.

2.0 The "liking", i.e., wanting, is in the past.

2.1 The "coming to the party" is at the same time as the wanting, or later. (It is in the past, at the same time as the wanting, or after the wanting.) But "would have" makes this more like a conditional structure, in fact, a counterfactual one. The most neutral statements of the implied condition are "if she had been invited" and "if she had been able to".

V would have liked to come to the party.

2.2 The "coming to the party" is previous to the time of the wanting. (It is in the past, farther back in the past than the wanting.) The comments about the conditional in 2.1 apply here as well.

V would have liked to have come to the party.

Paraphrases:
1.1. V wants to come to the party (tonight, tomorrow, next week).
1.2 V wants to be able to say, "I have attended the party".
2.1 V would have wanted (under certain conditions) to come to the party (that night, the next day, the next week).
2.2 V would have wanted (under certain conditions) to be able to say, "I have attended the party".

In most ordinary conversation 1.2, 2.1, and 2.2 are conflated in people's minds, so that most people detect little or no difference between them. Which one of the three is going to pop out of someone's mouth in a given situation is anybody's guess! They do differ from 1.1, however; that's certain.

CJ

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