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Papaya walk 536 Posted 5 years ago
Grammar

I could imagine myself writing about...

1) "As we walked through Facebook and Twitter, I could imagine myself sitting there coding throughout the day," she said. "I'm not afraid to be one of the first girls to go into one of those fields. I want to pursue this career and maybe a CEO of a company".

2) So it looks like I've got a ten-year lag between living in a place and writing about it. In ten years, I might try to write something about China. Really in all my life I've never seen anything like it. I could imagine myself writing about some New Jersey Dominican guy, doing the English-teaching expat thing in Shanghai. Maybe. I'm sure it would be really, really bad, too. (https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/this-week-in-fiction-questions-for-junot-daz)


Q: a) It seems to me that "could imagine" in (1) is different from that in (2). In (1), the "could" appears to mean "was able to", indicating past tense, whereas the "could" in (2) is more likely to have hypothetical meaning, indicating present tense. Is my understanding correct?

b) Does "could imagine" in (1) suggest she actually imagined that?

"As we walked through Facebook and Twitter, I imagined myself sitting there coding throughout the day," she said

  

Top answer

papaya walk 536 Q: a) It seems to me that "could imagine" in (1) is different from that in (2). In (1), the "could" appears to mean "was able to", indicating past tense, whereas the "could" in (2) is more likely to have hypothetical meaning, indicating present tense. Is my understanding correct?

— GPY

  • papaya walk 536 Q: a) It seems to me that "could imagine" in (1) is different from that in (2).
  • In (1), the "could" appears to mean "was able to", indicating past tense, whereas the "could" in (2) is more likely to have hypothetical meaning, indicating present tense.
  • Is my understanding correct?
  • That's how I read it too.
  • g.
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1 Answers
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papaya walk 536Q: a) It seems to me that "could imagine" in (1) is different from that in (2). In (1), the "could" appears to mean "was able to", indicating past tense, whereas the "could" in (2) is more likely to have hypothetical meaning, indicating present tense. Is my understanding correct?

That's how I read it too.

papaya walk 536
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