I think I would side with Dick Veit on this one - not even sure how I would have 
written it myself. I doubt I would have written "As were," however. Just one 
fussy note, though - it's Mary Shelley, not Shelly.

Smiles and a happy Thanksgiving to all.

Paul the fuss-pot
 "If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable 
fiction" (_Twelfth Night_ 3.4.127-128). 





________________________________
From: "Hancock, Craig G" <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Tue, November 22, 2011 1:06:22 PM
Subject: Re: Like/as

Bill,
    That's a great question. It's impossible to answer precisely because this 
(and other largely prescriptive texts) doesn't have a section in which a wider 
description of the language is attempted. It doesn't have a glossary or index 
where one can look up "phrase" and get a clear sense of what the term applies 
to. And their examples are far too limited to be of use.
    My guess is that they treat a head noun and its modifiers (what we would 
call noun phrase) as permissible. "Any performance like last week's performance 
would be unacceptable." I can't imagine using "as" in that sentence even though 
"last week's performance" is clearly a phrase and was treated as such in the 
structural grammars operative at the time. (Parts of this book date back to 
1935, but the usage discussion seems fifties oriented in its examples.)  

    There are sections of the book that I find clear and useful, other sections 
that seem almost goofy. I would put this advice in the goofy column.

Craig 

-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar 
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Spruiell, William C
Sent: Tuesday, November 22, 2011 11:45 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Like/as

Craig:

Was S&W really allowing single nouns after 'like', but not any multiword 
phrases? Or were they adopting the use of 'phrase' to refer only to PPs, VPs, 
etc.? If the former, that would be bizarrely wrong, but S&W are bizarrely wrong 
just often enough to make that reading plausible.

--- Bill Spruiell




On Nov 22, 2011, at 9:00 AM, "Hancock, Craig G" 
<[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:

Marshall,
    I am old enough to have been schooled in the old rules and to remember the 
controversy over the Winston ad.
    I have an original edition elements of Style ( 1959) which lays it out this 
way: "Like governs nouns and pronouns; before phrases and clauses the equivalent 
word is as. " You would say "As in the old days" rather than "like in the old 
days" and "as a cigarette should" rather than "like a cigarette should."
    S & W also describes the controversy and comes down on the side of the old 
rule. In essence, they are saying being current or in current usage doesn't mean 
it's right. "If every word or device that achieved currency were immediately 
authenticated, simply on the grounds of popularity, the language would be as 
chaotic as a ball game with no foul lines." This rather strange (but telling) 
analogy is intact in my 1972 edition.

Craig

From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar 
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