MSGID: 1:153/716.0 cbe7b1a3   
   REPLY: 2:221/6.0 5cb82188   
   CHRS: IBMPC 2   
   Hi, Alexander!  I'm glad you answered here because I intended this reply to be   
   addressed to both you & Mike, but forgot how to persuade timEd to do it:   
      
    AK>> Could the alchemist say, "But I wanted to show you that   
    AK>> it IS possible." After all he spoke of universal truth, at   
    AK>> least he thought so.   
      
    AH>  Yes, yes, and yes.... :-)   
      
      
                                 [...]   
      
    AH>  English grammar allows... but does not necessarily require   
    AH>  ... tense changes in reported speech, where the original   
    AH>  wording may not be cited as it was said.  I'd suggest   
    AH>  looking up "reported speech" vs. "direct speech". :-)   
      
    AK>  Where do you see the reported(indirect) speech? IMHO, if   
    AK>  we see quotation marks it is not the indirect speech:   
      
    AK>  "This was my Personal Legend, not yours," the alchemist   
    AK>  answered. "But I wanted to show you that it was possible."   
      
      
              Good point.  I don't know what happened before that & the situation   
   may not be quite the same as it would be if he were reminding the student what   
   he had said earlier.  AFAIC, though, you acknowleged a rather important detail   
   in your initial enquiry:  to him this possibility doesn't have a "best-before"   
   date as other concepts do.  I generally learn best when I understand why & you   
   explained it very well.  Native speakers often struggle with such matters too.   
   I'm reminded here of the senior citizen in a novel our daughter is reading who   
   comments that a lot of younger folks know how, but not why.  I found myself in   
   much the same position when, as a high school student, I was asked if  I would   
   be interested in tutoring another young woman who'd lived in Japan until quite   
   recently.  I felt she deserved better answers than "I dunno... that's just the   
   way we do it," but sometimes I wasn't sure about the whys & wherefores.  These   
   days I count on my Russian friends to add the relevant grammatical terminology   
   and, in many cases, to understand us better than we understand ourselves.  :-Q   
      
              IMHO you hit the nail on the head when you recognized that from the   
   alchemist's POV he was indeed referring to a universal truth.  This person had   
   evidently succeeded in accomplishing his goal, therefore "I wanted" belongs in   
   the past tense.  While I don't know of any rule(s) about the next bit it seems   
   logical to you & me & Mike to use the present tense.  Others who don't do that   
   may not have consciously thought about such fine shades of meaning and/or they   
   may erroneously believe all three clauses should use the same verb tense.  :-)   
      
      
      
      
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
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