Contain

Question

Which of the following are correct?
1# I will be grateful if you put here any site that contains this kind of books
2# I will be grateful if you put here any site contains this kind of books
3# I will be grateful if you put here any site containing this kind of books

1# is corrct i suppose. 2 sounds odd but seems to be correct frammatically to me. thanks

Maverick88 · Accepted Answer

Anyone please

MrPedantic · Answer

Hello M88

I wouldn't myself use any of those formations. Perhaps:

'I would be grateful if you could give me the address of any site that refers to this kind of book.'

MrP

Maverick88 · Answer

why wouldn't use it? Isn't is correct?

But anyway, if I want to use this kind of writing - what of the forms should be eliminated?
Maybe the following makes better sense:
"You should distribute it in every house contains\containing at least 3 flats."

Thanks

MrPedantic · Answer

Hello M88

I'm sorry I didn't explain why the sentences were wrong.

There were a couple of general problems:

a) In all cases you would say 'this kind of book'.

b) 'if you put here any site' isn't idiomatic; in my revised version, I've assumed that 'put' = 'post', 'here' = on this website, and 'any site' = 'the address of any other website'. But let me know if I've misunderstood.

c) 'I will be grateful' isn't ungrammatical, but the future tense isn't usually used in the context of a request. In a request, you would use the conditional: 'I would be grateful'.

Furthermore, #2 is ungrammatical because you need a 'that' between 'site' and 'contains'.

With your latest sentence, you would need a 'that' before 'contains':

'You should distribute it in every house that contains\containing at least 3 flats.'

(As you probably know, 'in every house' is correct here because each house in which 'it' will be distributed must contain 3+ letterboxes; but if you had only said 'every house', you would need to use 'to every house':

'You should distribute it to every house in this road.')

MrP

Maverick88 · Answer

So 3# is correct? (may containig be used there ?)

MrPedantic · Answer

'containing' is ok, in #3; but the sentence isn't idiomatic. See points A, B, C in my previous post!

MrP

Maverick88 · Answer

3#
I would be grateful if you post in this forum any address of a site containing this kind of book
Is it OK now?

MrPedantic · Answer

Not quite...You need a 'would' after 'if':

'I would be grateful if you would post in this forum any address of a site containing this kind of book.'

Or:

'I would be grateful if you could post in this forum any address of a site containing this kind of book.'

Or you could simply say:

'Please direct me to a website where I can find details of this kind of book.'

MrP

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