Not even X, much more Y [was: re: gill (verb) = laugh]

[Laurence Horn]

At 2:11 PM -0400 8/8/01, Douglas G. Wilson wrote:
>>>        "Haw, haw, haw," gilled Parkins, "yaw couldn't even turn a
>>>nickle over in your hand, much more turn a ball game."....'
>>I find the last part of Parkins's quote even more interesting, given
>>my research interests.  "(not even x) much more y" in place of "much
>>less y"?  Was/Is this widely attested?
>
>I've surely seen it repeatedly in books, even reasonably
>well-written material.
>
>Also analogous confusions like this:
>
>"If this is frequent in novels, how much more frequent must it be in
>newspaper columns?"
>
>"If this is frequent in novels, how much less frequent could it be in
>newspaper columns?"
>
>(*)"If this is frequent in novels, how much more frequent could it be in
>newspaper columns?"
>
>(*)"If this is frequent in novels, how much less frequent must it be in
>newspaper columns?"

Well, yes, but rhetorical questions with quantity words are a bit
tricky to process.  "not even x, must less y", though, I thought was
a frozen collocation, like "let alone", even granting the recent
tendency to "invert" the scales for the "much less" and "let alone"
constructions.  It's not a confused meaning that's weird in the
Parkins line as much as the form--do you have actual citations for
"not even x much more y"?

larry