Re: TSE's "Let us go then, you and I."

Wordsworth say, "We murder to dissect," and I've been trying to stay out of
a discussion about grammatical errors in a masterpiece. I've tried and
failed. Here's my two cents:

Two different arguments have been made that "you and I" is nominative:
    1. It's direct address.
    2. It's the subject of "go."

I don't buy either.

1. I don't see "you and I" as direct address because we don't include
ourselves in addressing others. I can't see someone saying, for example,
"You and I, let's go to a movie tonight." Pretty schizophrenic, although
that interpretation of the line might be worth a paper or two at MLA.

2. I don't see "you and I" as the subject of "go" because "go" is an
infinitive. Infinitives don't take nominative subjects that can be repeated
following the infinitive. If they did, we could say, "Let my people go, they."

I read "you and I" as an appositive, expanding "us." An appositive is in
the same case as the noun phrase it modifies. Here that would be objective:
"you and me." To murder the line, we could correct it to "Allow us (that
is, you and me) to go then." Eliot's line is poorer grammar but better poetry.

Dick Veit

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