[B-Greek] simple test *AURION HLQON
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at ioa.com
Tue Dec 13 15:37:07 EST 2005
On Dec 13, 2005, at 2:49 PM, Jim West wrote:
>
>
> Randall Buth wrote:
>
>> Yes, that misses the point about what aspect is. An event that has
>> not
>> yet happened may still be viewed perfectively. Note the following:
>> "He will write"
>> "He will be writing"
>> Both are future, but in fact, only the second "he will be writing" is
>> imperfective in aspect.
>
> How can one say, though, that "he will be writing"? He MAY be
> writing.
> But he WILL be- that's a whole other animal altogether. And unless
> one presumes omniscience it simply makes no sense. Even your "he will
> write" is nonsensical. He may indeed write, or he may choose to
> write.
> But he WILL? Such a statement has nothing to do with "aspect"
> unless
> one stands well above the arena and looks down in timelessness at a
> particular point in the future.
As I noted earlier today, Modern Greek has two futures:
NA GRAYEI: "he will write" (= "he will get it written (e.g. before
tomorrow morning)"
NA GRAFEI: "he will be writing" (= "he will be writing (e.g. while
you sleep tonight)"
And I think that indicates that these futures are perfectly
acceptable in English as well — and the semantic difference between
the two formulations is pretty clearly aspectual.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad2 at mac.com
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/
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