"Something there is that doesn=?iso-8859-1?Q?=92t_?=love retroactivity."

[Joel S. Berson]

At 1/6/2014 11:57 AM, Neal Whitman wrote:
>It's an allusion to the Robert Frost poem about walls, I assumed, and in
>the poem I figure Frost did it for metrical reasons. As for correctness,
>I take it to be a topicalization ("Something that doesn't love a wall,
>there is") combined with heavy NP shift. So technically correct, but
>awkward.

Or Welsh.  I recently watched "How Green Was My Valley" once
again.  Something like "it's a good man there is" is I think said
of/to Huw Morgan, but I didn't find it quickly.  But there is from the book:

"O, there is lovely to feel a book, a good book, firm in the hand,
for its fatness holds rich promise, and you are hot inside to think
of good hours to come."

"There is beautiful you are."

Source:  http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2329482-how-green-was-my-valley

Joel





>Neal
>
>On 1/6/2014 10:45 AM, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
>>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>-----------------------
>>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>Poster:       Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM>
>>Subject:
>>=?windows-1252?Q?=22Something_there_is_that_doesn=92t_love_retroa
>>                ctivit?= =?windows-1252?Q?y=2E=22?=
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>I saw this today in the NYTimes:
>>http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/06/opinion/greenhouse-crack-cocaine-limbo.html
>>
>>It feels wrong to me, but I can't put my finger on it. Is it technically
>>correct, but too Yoda-like? Help, please.
>>
>>DanG
>>
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