"all the faster" (in Latin too)

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Jun 29, 2005, at 10:19 AM, Peter McGraw wonders:

> --On Wednesday, June 29, 2005 9:51 AM -0700 "Arnold M. Zwicky"
> <zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU> wrote:

>> ...its regional status is pretty clear.  in the linguistic atlas
>> materials, it's very much a middle atlantic thing (concentrated from
>> new york through virginia), but by the time of DARE's collection it
>> was strongly a north midland/inland north thing (still in
>> pennsylvania, but centered in the ohio-through-illinois band)...

> That's odd.  Then where did I get it?  I'm like Beverly: when I saw
> the first message about who uses "all the ...er",  I thought,
> "Doesn't everybody??"  I did most of my growing up (from age 4 to
> college) on the West Coast and had a mother from Texas and Oklahoma
> and a father from Iowa.
> The closest I ever came to any of the areas Arnold mentions, until
> college,
> was being born in Cleveland and leaving (for Oklahoma) before age
> 1.  I can't document the use of the construction by people around
> me, but certainly never encountered any amusement, consternation or
> puzzlement when I used it.

the feature is "regional" in the sense that it's been concentrated in
certain regions.  but look at the DARE map for "all the farther, fu(r)
ther" (I.49) and you'll see that it's widely distributed, including
in california.  (but it's virtually absent in new england and in a
band from kentucky/tennessee through arkansas, louisiana, oklahoma,
the texas panhandle, new mexico, and arizona.  or was, when the DARE
material was collected.)

my college roommate (from louisville, ky.) was briefly baffled the
first time he noticed me using the construction.  he thought it was
just one of my quaint pennsylvania dutchisms.

arnold