[rant] As I read through the harry potter series, I noticed the word “dived” many times, and it always irked me. I kept thinking “damnit, why can’t she just say dove?”. Same with the word “breathed” (but far less common), it should be changed to brothe, or something…I don’t know. [/rant]
IME, from more than the occasional conversation with Brits aware of past-tense formation in the UK vs. America, there are nontrivial differences. If you encounter spelt, it’s highly likely to be coming from a Brit. Same with learnt and dived. As Rowling is a Brit, that’s my guess.
(The British versions of the HP books are rather strikingly different from the American versions, which are themselves not entirely up to the more rigorous of American standards. The most recent book, for example, was disgustingly ridden with comma splices.)
Many strong verbs (I dive, I dove, I have dived – or is it diven?) are gradually becoming weak verbs as the language changes over the centuries. I have noticed my newspaper using “shined” more often; I prefer “shone”, but I understand the process and I am not about to bitch about it. (I shine, I shone, I have shone, versus I shine, I shined, I have shined) Only very, very common strong verbs retain their strong past tenses (I give, I gave, I have given)
Steven Pinker made the point in one of his voluminous books that almost nobody knows the present tense of the strong past tense verb “wrought”, as in “What hath God wrought?”. It is not “wreak”. It is another verb which is now completely accepted with a weak conjugation (I x, I xed, I have xed).
Any guesses? I know the answer, neener neener neener…
That was me, not him. (You try to segregate by browser, and look where it gets you…)
Heh. I read the title and immediately thought of Harry Potter. It is annoying, but dived is an acceptable alternative for dove.
On the other hand, I don’t think that there’s any other past participle for “breathe” other than “breathed”.
I’ve noticed this in a lot of Rowling’s dialogue. No one seems to have taught her what a semi-colon is for.
I had to look this up. I never would have guessed.
In dialogue or certain specific settings, I could forgive it, as there’s a different way one reads “Why I love you, I need you, I want you” vs “Why I love you; why I need you; why I love you,” and you might be trying to establish a character speaking one way vs. the other. But if you’re going “Hermione carried her books to her side, her backpack was broken, so she was forced to lug the 50-lb tome Hogwarts, A History in by now a thoroughly defatigable right hand that had seen better days,” … well, you should reconsider the entirety of that sentence, but I hope the point is made:)
More to the point, over here “dove” is an almost completely unacceptable alternative for “dived”.
I had to look this up too. Interesting. Thanks, gabriela!
Snicker. Only on the Dope do people chime in, “I looked this up, it was interesting!” and the proposer of the tease never has to come through with the answer.
If I encounter spelt, it’s probably because I’m in the health foods aisle.
Being from Canada (and therefore having a little more in common with the Queen’s English) I consider “spelt” an improper spelling. “Dived” also hits my ear the wrong way.
Uh, spelt is British. They used spelled in the US.
Work? Not so unusual if you are familiar with wrought iron, which I’ve always understood as worked iron.
After I made my guess above I googled about, and ended up trying to get my head around an article about the various forms of “to be”. I may be a native speaker of English but I know so little of the workings beneath the bonnet! I shall, however, strive to use “wert” appropriately the next chance I get.
Wright, I would assume?
In my limited linguistics training, we learned that there are some weak verbs that sound like strong verbs, and therefore people often incorrectly treat the past tense as if it were a strong verb. I can’t remember any examples though. Anyone?
Really? I encounter it so rarely, even among Brits.
I think I’m [del]wright[/del] right. I think “wright” was a verb, meaning “work” in the metalsmith sense (and by extension in the playwright and other-wright sense), and of which “wrought” is the past and past-participle form.
AHunter3 is indeed right.
Award that strange man a camel toe to look at.
I encounter it frequently in situations where it might come up (i.e., not in a conversation about dishtowels, but quite often in grammar conversation), but I also talk a good bit with Brits about grammar.
Um, no, he’s not. Wrought is an old past participle of work. Wright has only ever been, to my knowledge, a noun. So says both etymonline.com and that Stephen Pinker book (I don’t remember which of his it was, but I remember reading that bit.)
Among people who go around deciding which word forms are “acceptable” and which are not, this seems like an awfully odd proclamation. Dived is the original form; dove is a more recent invention (and an American one, if memory serves.) Same with snuck instead of sneaked, though (apparently in contrast to dove) most people don’t consider snuck appropriate in formal writing.
I’m not going to live that down, am I?