[Ads-l] Intransitive "publish"

[Neal Whitman]

It’s definitely a middle voice, IMO. The other citations still have the publisher in the agent role. Here’s a recent episode for Grammar Girl that I wrote about middle voice, which sums up some of the recent research I read:

https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/middle-voice-sentences

Neal

> On Oct 10, 2018, at 3:54 PM, Marc Sacks <msacksg at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> I don't think any of these examples matches the one I cited, though maybe
> the 1972 entry comes close.
> 
> I read the " The newspapers do not publish on Good
> Friday" example more like "The network does not broadcast after midnight."
> 
> And "This just published" is like "This just in."
> 
> I don't see "the book published last month" in quite that way. Maybe it's
> middle voice, like "the book reads well"?
> 
> --Marc
> 
>> On Wed, Oct 10, 2018 at 3:00 PM Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: Intransitive "publish"
>> 
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> Intransitive "publish" is pretty common these days. OED3 breaks it down
>> into two senses: 3c (of an author, as in "publish or perish") and 3d (of a
>> work -- as Vox uses it). Examples for the latter sense date back to 1849:
>> 
>> 1849   Times 13 Aug. 10/2 (advt.)    Amusement while travelling--Publishing
>> monthly, one shilling each, the Railway Library.
>> 1918   C. S. Lewis Let. 27 Oct. (1966) 45   He [sc. Heinemann] told me that
>> John Galsworthy (who publishes with them) had seen my MS.
>> 1928   Public Opinion 6 Apr. 325/1   The newspapers do not publish on Good
>> Friday.
>> 1972   Evening Telegram (St. John's, Newfoundland) 24 June 1/1   The
>> Evening Telegram will publish Monday, June 26 which is being observed as
>> Discovery Day in Newfoundland.
>> 
>> I'd say the intransitive usage has been further popularized in the age of
>> online publishing. Among journalists you typically hear things like "this
>> just published" (i.e., just appeared online via publishing software), or if
>> you're in a hurry, "this just pubbed."
>> 
>> 
>>> On Wed, Oct 10, 2018 at 2:49 PM Marc Sacks <msacksg at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> I just encountered this in a "Vox" article:
>>> 
>>> Enterprising Southern women have been trading on this platonic ideal of a
>>> lifestyle forever. The latest is Reese Witherspoon, whose book *Whiskey
>> in
>>> a Teacup*
>>> <
>>> 
>> https://go.redirectingat.com?id=66960X1516588&xs=1&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FWhiskey-Teacup-Reese-Witherspoon%2Fdp%2F1471166228
>>>> 
>>> published last month.
>>> 
>>> Shouldn't that be "was published," or is it perhaps self-published? Has
>> any
>>> of you encountered the transitive "publish" elsewhere? It's new to me.
>>> 
>>> 
>> 
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org