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StephenLai Posted 20 years ago
Grammar

tense?

0Members of Congress from both political parties had made it clear they 01b00were prepared to02b00 impose testing and penalties on base ball if the players and management didn't reach a deal themselves.02br
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00Here, why can use 01b00"wer prepared to" ?02b02br
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00What is the tense of this usage?02br
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00Thanks in advance.0-
  

Top answer

0 Your sentence is like indirect discourse, in which what is said is reported rather than quoted. 22br 22blockquote 22blockquote 10If the verb in the main clause is in the present tense, the verb in the indirect discourse has its natural tense. But if the main verb is in the past or past perfect tense, the indirect discourse verb is in the past tense.

— Rvw

  • 0 Your sentence is like indirect discourse, in which what is said is reported rather than quoted.
  • 22br 22blockquote 22blockquote 10If the verb in the main clause is in the present tense, the verb in the indirect discourse has its natural tense.
  • But if the main verb is in the past or past perfect tense, the indirect discourse verb is in the past tense.
  • 42br 42font 42blockquote 42blockquote 32blockquote 21font 10But when the verb of the main clause is in the past tense or the past perfect tense, the verb of the subordinate clasue is attracted into the past, even though the notional time is present or future:12br 12font 11blockquote 11blockquote 21blockquote 31font 40Barwell said he was ill.
  • )42br 40Barwell said he would be ill.
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44 Answers
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0 Your sentence is like indirect discourse, in which what is said is reported rather than quoted. For example:01blockquote
01blockquote
10Direct discourse: Members had said, "We are prepared to impose testing."22br
22br
20Indirect discourse: Members had said that they were prepared to impose testing.22br
22blockquote
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0Wow! It is so clear. Thank you very much.02br
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00Well, There is another question:02br
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00In the sentence, ...01b00they were prepared to impose02b00..., they indicates the members of Congress, right?02br
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00Then, the members of Congress should 01b00prepare to impose02b00, not 0
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0 The verb is question is some form of 01font00to be02font00. 01font00Prepared02font00 is not part of the verb; it is a past participle used as an adjective. It's like:01blockquote
01blockquote
11blockquote
21font30 Members of Con
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0Ok~02br
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00Thank you very much~0-
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0 Hello StephanLai02br
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00As RVW said, you had better understand that the "be prepared to" is an adjectival predicate to mean "have already prepared to". 02br
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00English still retains a few relics of the old perfective construct of the form <be V-ed> where V is an intransitive verb. This construct was relatively often used to express the per
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0Thank you guys!02br
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00Your answers make me understand it clearly.02br
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00Thanks a lot.050010id1
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0Please excuse my curiosity. Is "She 01font00is arrive02font00d in Israel" an acceptable construct?0-
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0 To my American ear, it sounds (acceptably) British. I would not expect to hear it in the States.0-
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0 It is not acceptable in British English either. 0-
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0 I once read a headline "Brad Pitt is arrived in Tokyo!" in some newspaper.02br
00Here is another example from a UK site : "Robin Hood is arrived in Nottingham disguised as Sir Angus of the Prune for the archery contest". 02br
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00Actually "a person is arrived" is not idiomatic in current English, but "a thing is arrived at" is idiomatic even in current Englis
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