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Johnson13 Posted 13 years ago
Grammar
non-semantic continuum
A sentence by J. Brodsky: But apart from pure linguistic necessity, what makes one write is not so much a concern for one's perishable flesh as the urge to spare certain things of one's world - of one's personal civilization - one's own non-semantic continuum.
According to the OALD http://oald8.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/dictionary/spare_2, SPARE, as far as I can make out, is used as a ditransitive verb, and the direct object should be 'one's own non-semantic continuum', and Brosky thinks the urge is a more important thing that drives a poet to write, but could you tell me what exactly this urge is? (eg what does it mean by non-semantic contiuum?)
PS According to the OED, CONTINUUM is a continuous thing, quantity, or substance; a continuous series of elements passing into each other, but this definition does not help.
According to the OALD http://oald8.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/dictionary/spare_2, SPARE, as far as I can make out, is used as a ditransitive verb, and the direct object should be 'one's own non-semantic continuum', and Brosky thinks the urge is a more important thing that drives a poet to write, but could you tell me what exactly this urge is? (eg what does it mean by non-semantic contiuum?)
PS According to the OED, CONTINUUM is a continuous thing, quantity, or substance; a continuous series of elements passing into each other, but this definition does not help.
Top answer
That's what you get for reading geniuses. We can only try to play catch-up. " It is not ditransitive in that use ("Pilate spared Barabbas" is the same grammatically as "Pilate pardoned Barabbas").
- That's what you get for reading geniuses.
- We can only try to play catch-up.
- " It is not ditransitive in that use ("Pilate spared Barabbas" is the same grammatically as "Pilate pardoned Barabbas").
- Brodsky claims that we want to keep parts of our world alive after we die.
- Brodsky just slams my face into a wall with "non-semantic continuum".
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4 Answers
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That's what you get for reading geniuses. We can only try to play catch-up.
It's definition 3, "to allow somebody/something to escape harm, damage or death, especially when others do not escape it." It is not ditransitive in that use ("Pilate spared Barabbas" is the same grammatically as "Pilate pardoned Barabbas"). Brodsky claims that we want to keep parts of our world alive after we die
It's definition 3, "to allow somebody/something to escape harm, damage or death, especially when others do not escape it." It is not ditransitive in that use ("Pilate spared Barabbas" is the same grammatically as "Pilate pardoned Barabbas"). Brodsky claims that we want to keep parts of our world alive after we die
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Johnson13what makes one write is not so much a concern for one's perishable flesh as the urge to spare certain things of one's worldIs that a typo? Should it not be 'share'?
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Thanks.
But I, as usual, typed the whole sentence myself, and after checking it I couldn't find any typing mistakes.
But I, as usual, typed the whole sentence myself, and after checking it I couldn't find any typing mistakes.
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