the then, the late, and in the room of

[Wilson Gray]

"Late" has always been very much alive and kicking, IME. I don't find
anything interesting in the examples suggested.

However, that someone writing *formally* in *1855* should be using
"_the *then*_ representatives" *is*, to *me*, worthy of note, because
I had *long* - my entire literate life, almost - labored under the
misprehapprehension that this particular syntactic structure was
something introduced a couple of dekkids or so ago by people too
can't-be-bothered to write "Those who were the representatives at that
time" or something similar.

-Wilson

On Wed, Feb 10, 2010 at 1:48 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: the then, the late, and in the room of
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 2/10/2010 12:17 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>
>>Victor quotes
>>
>>"... _the then_ representatives ..."
>>
>>from1855. Amazing! Had anybody asked me, I would have WAG-ed _the
>>then_ from more like 1965! Youneverknow!
>
> In the previous century, one might have read "the late
> representatives ...", even tough they were still alive.  (That is,
> "late" meaning "former".)  Or "in the room of the late representative
> ...", but not meaning the new one took the old one's office!
>
> Joel
>
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>



--
-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"––a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
–Mark Twain

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