I don't understand!! please help!!

Question

Hi everybody!!I'm reading a book and there is a sentence which I don't understand (about verb time)it will be easer if I write the sentence and then I will explain you my problem;"I'm afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning". (said Holmes)so, I don't understand why he says " we sat down" and not "we were sitting down"?Can you explain me the reason?I'm learning english and I have some problems about verb times , it's very different from french !!Bye bye

Davkett · Accepted Answer

Are you sure the sentence is correctly quoted?

Does it actually go like this?--

"I'm afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go," said Holmes, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning.

If the phrase had been written, "as we sat together for our breakfast one morning", one could just as well write, "as we were sitting together." But 'as we sat down' is a momentary action, and does not translate well in this case into its present particple version, "as we were sitting down", unless it means, "as we were about to sit down."

Marius Hancu · Answer

Davkett Are you sure the sentence is correctly quoted?
Does it actually go like this?--
"I'm afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go," said Holmes, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning.

yes, see e.g.
-----------
"I am afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go," said Holmes, as we sat
down together to our breakfast one morning.

http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/lit/detective/MemoirsofSherlockHolmes/Chap1.html

-----------

Davkett · Answer

Thanks for that link, MH.

Thethenothere123 · Answer

When quoting something that also includes a quoted section, we use both single and double quotations to indicate the difference.

AmE: "'I am afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go,' said Holmes, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning."

BrE (I think): '"I am afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go", said Holmes, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning'.

Marius Hancu · Answer

Davkett"I'm afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go," said Holmes, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning.
'as we sat down' is a momentary action, and does not translate well in this case into its present participle version

Very interesting issue. Would you or others here have other examples of such momentary actions? I'm sure you're right, but let's try to find some general patterns here.

CalifJim · Answer

Verbs of body posture or assuming such a posture.

To place oneself in a sitting, lying, kneeling, standing position:

to sit down, to lie down, to kneel down, to stand up. (usually)

To be in a sitting, lying, kneeling, standing position.

to be sitting, to be lying, to be kneeling, to be standing. (usually)

The verbs of placing oneself in a certain position usually take the adverbial particle (down, up) and are not used in the progressive form (-ing).

The verbs of being in a certain position do not usually take the adverbial particle and are used in the -ing form.

a We stood up when the king entered the room.
b We were standing when the king entered the room.

To complicate matters, the reverse patterns (including/excluding the particle) are possible, but not the most used.

c We stood when the king entered the room. (Same meaning as a.)
d We were standing up when the king entered the room. (Same meaning as b.)

b and d have the normal reading of We were (already) in the standing position when ... and an alternate reading of We were just in the act of (en train de) placing ourselves in the standing position when ...
(a and c do not have a similar set of alternate readings. They only mean that when we saw the king enter, as a consequence, we placed ourselves in the standing position.)

(The same observations apply to all the verbs of this general category.)

CJ

Davkett · Answer

Others not related to body positions:

...said Holmes--
as a shot rang out (not 'as a shot was ringing out')
as the train came to a stop (not 'as the train was coming to a stop')
as the clock struck 'one' ( not 'as the clock was striking "one"')
as I sneezed (not 'as I was sneezing')
as we bolted out the door (not 'as we were bolting out the door')
as we exploded into thin air (not 'as we were exploding into thin air')
as the falcon swooped down, lifting him up (not 'as the falcon was swooping down, lifting him up')

Marius Hancu · Answer

DavkettOthers not related to body positions:

as the train came to a stop (not 'as the train was coming to a stop')

I had my doubts about this one, as I felt it as a somewhat protracted action (not instanteneous), but searching at Yahoo has confirmed your point,

'as the train was coming to a stop'

is 10 times less frequent, i.e. pretty much non-standard.

MrPedantic · Answer

"I'm afraid, Watson, that I shall have to go," said Holmes, as we sat down together to our breakfast one morning.

Sometimes "sit down" has the sense of "be sitting", rather than "cause posterior to descend", in older texts (cf. Psalm 137, "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down...").

So it may be that the underlined part doesn't present an action, but is simply a literary way of saying that they were sitting together at breakfast ("as" having the sense of "while").

MrP

CalifJim · Answer

Mr. P.,

What makes you say that, in the Biblical quote, sat down has the sense of be sitting?
Just that you get the "feel" that that's what it means? Or do you have corroborating evidence?

(I ask because it has no sense whatsoever of be sitting to me and every sense of caused the posterior to descend!)

CJ

I don't understand!! please help!!

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