MSGID: 1:153/716.0 f00b4fd2   
   REPLY: 2:221/6.0 5ef873f8   
   CHRS: IBMPC 2   
   Hi, Anton!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:   
      
   AH>  Some folks consider it acceptable to introduce a tense   
   AH>  change at the beginning of a new paragraph, but AFAIC   
   AH>  it's distracting & unpleasant.  I would suggest you pick   
   AH>  one or the other & avoid changing horses in midstream....   
      
   AS>  This very morning I have enountered that device in Peter   
   AS>  Taylor for the second time,   
      
      
              I think you mean Peter Taylor (1917-1944), from the US.  :-)   
      
      
      
   AS>  but it is the first time that I have found the time (time,   
   AS>  time, time...) to quote it:   
      
      
              Not to worry!  I guess folks like you & Alexander are really paying   
   attention when you ask about something I posted months or even years ago.  ;-)   
      
      
      
   >>>  They were on their wa downstairs again now, and by the time   
   >>>  they had finished with this favorite subject the would be   
   >>>  downstairs.   
   >>>  They would be in the dark, flower-bedecked downstairs hall   
   >>>  and just before entering the dining room for the promised   
   >>>  refreshments: the fruit jello, the English tea biscuits,   
   >>>  the lime punch.   
      
   >>>  And now foor a moment Mr. Dorset bars the way to the dining   
   >>>  room and prevents is sister from opening the closed door.   
   >>>  "Now, my good friends," he says, "let us eat, drink, and   
   >>>  be merry!"   
      
      
              Hmm.  Peter Taylor may have considered it acceptable to introduce a   
   tense change at the beginning of a new paragraph, but I don't see what purpose   
   it serves here.  Miss Langwidge wouldn't have allowed her students to do that.   
   And WRT the above example I find the tense change distracting at least in part   
   because... together with the content... it sounds much like what I overhear at   
   the local pub.  I can't help wondering if the narrator had already sampled the   
   lime punch and if that's the effect the author wanted to achieve... [chuckle].   
      
      
      
      
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
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