In the past week, I've been asked about two sentences that seem to ignore what we all think we know about number.

Here is the first: If I had learned English in my native country, I wouldn't have these many problems."  "Problems" certainly seems to be the noun here, but we would all say "this many problems," not "these many problems." We would say "these problems." Is this an example of postpositioning that was discussed last week? I can imagine saying "These many problems are bothering me." But in speaking there would be an emphasis on many and a pause between these and many not used normally.

And here is the second: "In recent weeks, a string of teenagers have killed themselves after being tormented by classmates........ " We would usually say that string is the subject and requires a singular verb. However, that clearly would be very strange here and we certainly wouldn't have the string killing itself. Is it the reflexive here that requires the plural verb?

Edith Wollin

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