I really appreciate the analysis and commentary on the sentence I sent.  I think the idea that ‘their best’ has an adverbial function and that ‘to express what love means to them’ is functioning as a direct object is most convincing.  That sentence has been bothering me for years.

 

Janet

 

From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of MARTHA KOLLN
Sent: Saturday, May 02, 2009 6:48 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: New Sentence

 



On Fri, May 1, 2009 09:34 AM, Dick Veit <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Beth, Dick, et al.,

Sentences can get really tricky (and ambiguous) when idioms like "tried their best" are involved.  The first thing I questioned about the artist sentence was whether the infinitive phrase could be written with "in order," which I consider the first test for "adverbial":  

                        I drove fast [in order] to get home in time for the news.

The other test, as someone mentioned, is movability:

                        To get home in time for the news, I drove fast.

When "try" is connected with an infinitive, that infinitive is nearly always a direct object--a "something" or "someone":

                        I tried to get home in time for the news.  i.e., I tried "something."

In the artist sentence, it seems to me that the infinitive passes the "something" test more clearly than the "in order to" test.  It's true that  "tried their best" is indeed a common expression, I think that "tried very hard" is what it means (an adverbial of degree), rather than "tried something."

For the infinitive phrase here to be adverbial--to pass either the "in order" test or the movability test--the sentence would need a clear "something" as direct object:

 

Artists of all kinds have tried beauty and truth in all of its manifestations [in order] to express what love means to them.

This sentence works in the passive:

            Beauty and truth in all of their manifestations have been tried by artists to express what love means to them. 

While the original artist sentence, with its infinitive as direct object, doesn't work in the passive, that doesn't mean it isn't transitive. Most transitive verbs that take infinitives (want, like, expect, etc.) are not passive candidates either:  

                                    I want to take piano lessons.

                                    I like to play the guitar.

                       

I expect to perform at Carnegie Hall.

Verbs that take gerunds as direct objects could possibly be squeezed into a passive, but it's not very comfortable:

                       

The audience enjoyed listening to the guitar music.  

                                    ?Listening to the guitar music was enjoyed by the audience. [I don't think so!]

That's my take on those expressive artists.

Martha

 

                                   

 

 

 

 

 

Beth,

Good point. Our problem is that "tried my best" is an idiomatic phrase, which limits internal analysis. All of these are possible:

I tried to succeed.
I attempted to succeed.
I endeavored to succeed.

But "my best" only works with "tried":

I tried my best to succeed.
* I attempted my best to succeed.
* I endeavored my best to succeed.

Interestingly, it is also possible to use "tried my best" in a different, nonidiomatic way, where "my best" is the direct object:

First I tried a half-hearted effort, but it didn't work, so I tried my best, and that worked.

Unlike the other uses, here "my best" is what was tried, not how something was tried.

Dick

On Fri, May 1, 2009 at 8:40 AM, Beth Young <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Hi Dick,

Interesting!  I find your reasoning very persuasive.

Still . . . "their best" isn't at all moveable.  And there are lots of examples of "x gave y their best," in which "their best" is a direct object.

Could it be that our intuition about how fixed an entity "their best" is?  i.e., if you think of "their best" as a discrete, identifiable effort, like a poem or a chocolate souffle, then the phrase seems nominal and "to express what love means to them" seems adverbial.  But if you think of "their best" as a kind of move in a certain direction (like moving towards the horizon--you never arrive), then "to express what love means to them" seems more nominal and "their best" more adverbial.

(I'm a bit boggled to hear myself proposing that the distinction between nominal/adverbial can be ambiguous.)

Beth

>>> Dick Veit <[log in to unmask]> 4/30/2009 6:40 PM >>>

Beth,

Re: "Artists of all kinds have tried their best to express what love means
to them."

The phrase "to express what love means to them" is certainly an infinitive
phrase, but is it adverbial or nominal?

  - I tried a poem to express my love.
        This infinitive phrase is adverbial, indicating why I tried the
  poem.
  - I tried to express my love.
        This infinitive phrase is nominal, the direct object of "tried."

I opt for nominal in our sentence. I think "their best" is an adverbial, not
the direct object, since it answers the question "Tried how?" rather than
"Tried what?" On the other hand, "to express what love means to them" can
answer the question "Tried what?" so I'd say it is the direct object.

Dick


On Thu, Apr 30, 2009 at 4:29 PM, Beth Young <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> "Artists of all kinds have tried  their best to express what love  means to
> them."
>
> Here's my take:  "to express what love means to them" is an adverbial
> infinitive phrase.
>
> 1. You can move it around:  To express what love means to them, artists of
> all kinds have tried their best.
>
> 2.  It answers the question "why" or "in what manner" the verb happens.
>  Artists of all kinds have tried their best. Why? "to express what love
> means to them."
>
> Without that adverbial infinitive phrase, it's easier to see that the main
> sentence is transitive:  THEY have tried SOMETHING.
>
> "Their best" is a noun phrase/direct object.  I don't have a problem with
> "best" functioning as a noun--contrast with "their happy" which clearly
> doesn't work.
>
> To make the whole sentence passive would be clunky, but it is doable:
>
> "To express what love means to them, their best has been tried (by artists
> of all kinds)."
>
> This passive sentence is bothersome, not so much because of the passive
> voice, but because we don't know who "them" and "their" refers to until we
> get to the end.  I could imagine writing this sort of passage:
>
> Their best has been tried.  (And it still wasn't good enough.)
>
> That's how I see it, anyway.  Thanks for the distraction from paper
> grading.
>
> Beth
>
>

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