You must have felt sad
lcy
I would like to write the following sentence, but I am not sure if
it is correct. Please give me advice. Thanks a lot!
The sentence is as follows.
" You must have felt sad, haven't you?"
Ray O'Hara
"lcy" <lcyi...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:009ad839-82e9-4aa9...@s24g2000pri.googlegroups.com...
Put didn't for haven't. but really ditch that whole clause.
This is better
You must have been saddened.
Ian Jackson
<raymon...@hotmail.com> writes
suspicious. But after looking for possible alternatives ("weren't"?), it
is obvious that "didn't" is what most native English speakers would say.
Compare
"You must have felt sad, didn't you?"
and
"You must have been sad, weren't you?"
There's something niggling at me about the first.
However, "You felt sad, didn't you?" is fine, and I presume that the
"didn't" is a 'throwback' to the formation the past tense by using the
form "did feel".
But, somehow, the "must have" seems to confuse the grammar.
"You must have been saddened" is, of course, fine, but it is a somewhat
different way of saying the sentence. Also, "feeling sad" and "being
saddened" are arguably somewhat different in their application. "Being
saddened" is something which happens when you hear about something which
makes you feel sad. "Feeling sad" is an ongoing situation - possibly
long after you were saddened.
--
Ian
Don Phillipson
news:009ad839-82e9-4aa9...@s24g2000pri.googlegroups.com...
>>> I would like to write the following sentence, but I am not sure if
>>> it is correct. Please give me advice. Thanks a lot!
>>>
>>> The sentence is as follows.
>>> " You must have felt sad, haven't you?"
"Ian Jackson" <ianREMOVET...@g3ohx.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:FUb66KFp...@g3ohx.demon.co.uk...
>>This is better
>>You must have been saddened.
>>
> If you think about it TOO much, even "didn't" begins to sound somewhat
> suspicious. But after looking for possible alternatives ("weren't"?), it
> is obvious that "didn't" is what most native English speakers would say.
>
> Compare
> "You must have felt sad, didn't you?"
> and
> "You must have been sad, weren't you?"
> There's something niggling at me about the first.
> However, "You felt sad, didn't you?" is fine, and I presume that the
> "didn't" is a 'throwback' to the formation the past tense by using the
> form "did feel". But, somehow, the "must have" seems to confuse the
> grammar.
Beware: inferences about the implicit interior logic of English grammar is
a high-risk game, apparently not successul here.
Usage suggests that "Didn't I/you/he/she/it/we/they?" is a standard phrase
in English, functionally the same as the French "n'est ce pas?" or the
Anglo-Welsh "isn't it," and most often used as an intensifier. No
evidence suggests
"You must have felt sad, didn't you?"
contains any inferences about an unsaid "did feel." The standard phrase
"didn't you" was merely attached to the main clause, in the same way it
has been attached to other similar sentences, and without regard to the
use of DO or HAVE as auxiliary verbs.
The OP's error similarly goes one logical step too far, suggesting the
HAVE in "haven't you" is somehow related to the auxiliary HAVE in
the main verb form "have felt." Common sense does indeed suggest
that similar words have similar functions in either grammar or syntax --
but English is more complicated (and less logical) than that.
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)
Pavel314
To me, the sentence is reminding the listener that at some point in
their life, for whatever reason, they felt sad. So they should
understand that the speaker or someone else is sad and that it's
justifiable. The sentence,
"You must have felt sad, didn't you?"
seems to be asking about a specific instance. "Your llama died? Your
must have felt sad, didn't you?"
Paul
Glenn Knickerbocker
>"lcy" <lcyi...@yahoo.com> wrote
>> " You must have felt sad, haven't you?"
>Put didn't for haven't.
I'd say both were possible, with different meanings. With "didn't," I'd
make the question a separate sentence:
You must have felt sad (at some time or other), haven't you?
You must have felt sad (at that particular time). Didn't you?
ŹR http://users.bestweb.net/~notr/kartuli "Hush!
They sing choruses in public. That's mad enough, I think."
Pat Durkin
"lcy" <lcyi...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:009ad839-82e9-4aa9...@s24g2000pri.googlegroups.com...
Not that anyone would say it in these days, but the options could
include, "...mustn't you?"
I would say, (given enough time to plan my utterance):
"You must have felt sad, right?"
CDB
> "lcy" <lcyi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>> I would like to write the following sentence, but I am not sure
>> if
>> it is correct. Please give me advice. Thanks a lot!
>>
>
> Not that anyone would say it in these days, but the options could
> include, "...mustn't you?"
>
that meaning (I think). I'd be a lot happier with the general "Didn't
you?" if it were more clearly separated from "must": "You must have
felt sad -- didn't you?"
>
> I would say, (given enough time to plan my utterance):
> "You must have felt sad, right?"
>
Pat Durkin
"CDB" <belle...@sympatico.ca> wrote in message
news:i7fq07$j8$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
am surprised your "innit?" didn't come up earlier.
Old Dutch--or Old Milwaukee German immigrant English>"ain't?"
--
Pat Durkin
durkinpa at msn.com
Wisconsin