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Park sang joon Posted 10 years ago
Grammar

The analyses of a sentence

The narrator recalls his childhood, now of his early time in Salem House, the boarding school near London.
Mr. Creakle, who is the owner of the school, is extremely harsh toward his students.
Today Mr. Creakle keeps the house owing to indisposition.
The narrator's senior and friend, Steerforth urges the other juniors to make fun of one of the school's poor master Mr. Mell, who is one of the narrator's favorite.

......................................
"And when you make use of your position of favouritism here, sir," pursued Mr. Mell, with his lip trembling very much, "to insult a gentleman?"
"A what??where is he?" said Steerforth.
Here somebody cride out, "Shame, J. Steerforth! Too bad!"
It was Traddles, whom Mr. Mell instantly dicomfited by biding him to hold his tongue.
?"To insult one who is not fortunate in life, sir, and who never gave you the least offence, and the many reasons for not insulting whom you are old enough and wise enough to understand," said Mr. Mell.
[David Copperfield by Charles Dickens]
I think "to insult one who is not fortunate in life, sir, and who never gave the least offence" and "understand the many reasons for not insulting whom." modify "old enough and wise enough."
And I think "the many reasons for not insulting whom" is the object of understand."
If so I was wondering why there is "and" before "the many reasons for not insulting whom."
Thank you in advance for your help.
  

Top answer

" is a continuation of what was previously said. The following is implied: when you make use of your position of favouritism here ... to insult one who is not fortunate in life ...

— GPY

  • " is a continuation of what was previously said.
  • The following is implied: when you make use of your position of favouritism here ...
  • to insult one who is not fortunate in life ...
  • You are correct on the second point, as amended above.
  • " I expect you would have no difficulty with it.
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11 Answers
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park sang joonI think "to insult one who is not fortunate in life, sir, and who never gave the least offence" and "to understand the many reasons for not insulting whom." modify "old enough and wise enough."
"to insult one who is not fortunate in life ..." is a continuation of what was previously said. The following i
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A small point.

You keep using the word 'senior' in an unnatural way.
Instead of eg the narrator's senior and friend
say eg the narrator's older friend.

Clive
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CliveYou keep using the word 'senior' in an unnatural way.
I have to respectfully disagree with Clive on this point. To me it sounds OK to say that an older boy at school is someone's "senior". It could be a regional difference.
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Hi GPY,
Thanks for the comment.
Does this excerpt from another of Park's threads also sound OK to you?

The narrator recalls his childhood, now of his early time in Salem House, the boarding school near London.
He was called before his senior J. Steerforth, entrus
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I believe that 'senior' and 'junior' are nineteenth-century British boarding school terms, and Park is just mimicking what he is reading in David Copperfield. I also suspect that the introductions to his quotations are not his own language but text taken from summaries of each chapter of that book, written by someone else and only slightly modified for the purpose of presenting them here on the f
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CliveThe narrator recalls his childhood, now of his early time in Salem House, the boarding school near London.He was called before his senior J. Steerforth, entrusted all his money, seven shillings to him.The narrator recalls his childhood, now of his early time in Salem House, the boarding school near London.
The bold part sounds OK to me. Obviously there ar
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Thank you, GPY, for your so very kind answer.
Thank you, Clive, for your advice.

I thought "senior" can also mean "a student in higher grade."
Thank you, Mr.Jim, for your message.

The first paragraph is of my own making, though I sometimes extract some words or phrases from the book.
I am very shameful that now I can find several errors for
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park sang joonThen, I was wondering if "reasons for insulting whom" is fronted and "one" is an object of "insulting."
"whom" is the grammatical object of "insulting", but "whom" refers to "one".
park sang joonSo, I'd like to know I can rephrase "To insult one ~ reasons for not insulting whom you are old enough and wise enough to underst
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Thank you, GPY, for your continuing support.
I'm so sorry for my poor understanding.

I'm not exactly sure what "~" signifies in your phrases.
It refers to ellipsis of between words.


"And when you make use of your position of favouritism here, sir, to insult one who is not fortunate in life, sir, and wh
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park sang joonNow I think "whom" is a non-restrictive relative pronoun.
Right. "whom" has the same role as the two "who"s, except it is the object of the relative clause rather than the subject.
park sang joonSo I was wondering I can rephrase "and the many reasons for not insulting whom you are old enough and wise enough to understand."
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