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Faulkner: had they seen
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Marius Hancu
May 25, 2013, 9:05:37 AM5/25/13
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Hello:
---
[this is a strange day in this Southern town, and the black people are
not around to be seen]
[...] but this was Monday, a new day and a new week, rest and the need
to fill time and conquer boredom was over, children fresh for school
and husband and father for store or office or to stand around the
Western Union desk where the hourly cotton reports came in; breakfast
must be forward and the pandemoniac bustle of exodus yet still no
Negro had they seen — the young ones with straightened hair and makeup
in the bright trig tomorrow’s clothes from the mailorder houses who
would not even put on the Harper’s Bazaar caps and aprons until they
were inside the white kitchens and the older ones in the ankle-length
homemade calico and gingham who wore the long plain homemade aprons
all the time so that they were no longer a symbol but a garment [...]
Intruder in the Dust
William Faulkner
---
"yet still no Negro _had they_ seen": why inversion, because of
“still”?? Or for emphasis?
Thanks.
--
Marius Hancu
---
[this is a strange day in this Southern town, and the black people are
not around to be seen]
[...] but this was Monday, a new day and a new week, rest and the need
to fill time and conquer boredom was over, children fresh for school
and husband and father for store or office or to stand around the
Western Union desk where the hourly cotton reports came in; breakfast
must be forward and the pandemoniac bustle of exodus yet still no
Negro had they seen — the young ones with straightened hair and makeup
in the bright trig tomorrow’s clothes from the mailorder houses who
would not even put on the Harper’s Bazaar caps and aprons until they
were inside the white kitchens and the older ones in the ankle-length
homemade calico and gingham who wore the long plain homemade aprons
all the time so that they were no longer a symbol but a garment [...]
Intruder in the Dust
William Faulkner
---
"yet still no Negro _had they_ seen": why inversion, because of
“still”?? Or for emphasis?
Thanks.
--
Marius Hancu
Jerry Friedman
May 25, 2013, 7:09:53 PM5/25/13
to
inversion? For emphasis or variety. It's probably more common with a
negative than without.
--
Jerry Friedman
Marius Hancu
May 26, 2013, 7:14:26 PM5/26/13
to
--
Marius Hancu
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