till

[Laurence Horn]

At 11:41 AM -0400 10/1/01, Beverly Flanigan wrote:
>At 10:38 AM 10/1/01 -0400, you [Mark Mandel] wrote:
>>... I was right in there on "my your", which -- at least in the digest
>>-- was intertwined with "yo"; which might be the cause of this your
>>confusion. ;-)\  ... Now, *that* double determiner has a Shakespearean ring
>>to it.
>>
>
>But isn't your example really a topic + comment construction?  i.e., "this,
>your confusion" in writing?

If I can presume to speak for Mark, no, there is a "Shakespearean"
reading where "this" and "your" are dueling determiners (= 'this
confusion of yours').  I know this has been described but I don't
know when it disappeared from the grammar of (standard) English.


>   I see "till" all the time in our field, esp. with ref. to the time
>expression, which has become a frozen frame, it seems to me.  Does anyone
>not agree with me on this??
>
I don't (not agree with you).  For me it's either "until" or "till".
I do balk at "til" (sans apostrophe), and (apostrophed) "'til"
strikes me as somewhat quaint.

Larry