The second instalment of ideas to take your English to the next level – or at least in a more formal direction. These notes could be of interest not only for natives but for foreign learners too.
Linking phrases with "-ing" participles
For a flowing style, link separate statements using the present participle:
- “Please send photos, remembering to write the name on the back”
- “Music also has a concern with duration, the big difference being that…”
- “I think in my own case that, living abroad as I do, …”
Here’s a nice example of various linking phrases (from Sherlock Holmes’s Final Problem):
- “In the morning you will send for a hansom, desiring your man to take neither the first nor the second which may present itself. Into this hansom you will jump, and you will drive to the Strand end of the Lowther Arcade, handing the address to the cabman upon a slip of paper, with a request that he will not throw it away”.
Prefer nouns to verbs
Let’s avoid verbs when we can, especially in phrases when we talk generally about “people” or “everyone”. We just need to think of the corresponding noun:
- “People expect that…” -> “There is an expectation that…”
- “Teachers resent that…” -> “There’s a resentment on the part of teachers that…”
- “People hope that…” -> “The hope is that…”
- “People tend to praise…” -> “There is a tendency to praise…”
- “Bob requested it, …” -> “At the request of Bob, …”
- “Bob advised that I try in town” -> “On the advice of Bob, I tried in town”
- “which my schoolfriends hated” -> “to the hate of my schoolfriends”
- “I was surprised that…” -> “To my surprise, …”
- “We rely on…” -> “We are reliant on…” (here replacing a verb with an adjective)
Prefer nouns to adjectives
- “It is overwhelmingly beautiful” -> “It is of an overwhelming beauty”
- “Moving house is agonising” -> “The agonies of moving house”
- ‘It is enjoyable to explore the countryside” -> “The joys of exploring the countryside”
Stating negatives affirmatively
The key is to avoid the ungainly “not” and “any”:
- “I’m not promising anything” -> “I’m promising nothing”
- “There aren’t many” -> “There are few”
- “It doesn’t recall anything to my mind” -> “It recalls nothing to my mind”
- “So, you can’t throw any light on the matter?” -> “You can throw no light on the matter?”
- “There isn’t anything more dramatic than this one” -> “…, none more dramatic than this one”
- Jimmy Carr: “If you’re a lesbian and you didn’t find that funny, you’re surprising no one”
Conditionals
Our continental cousins, having studied formal English with grammar books, often master these forms better than we do. Remember that “if” should be followed by the subjunctive case when posing speculative hypotheticals:
- “If I were rich, …”
- “If we were to go out tomorrow, …” (as opposed to “If we go out tomorrow” or “if we are to go out tomorrow”; or even nicer we might avoid “if” by using the inversion “Were we to go out tomorrow, …”)
When focusing on a possibility, we can employ “should” rather than the “if + subjunctive” formula:
- “if interest rates go up” -> “should interest rates go up”
- “if that’s the case” -> “should that be the case”
- “if he is available” -> “should he be available”
- “if you need assistance” -> “should you need assistance”
However, “should” can’t be used when speculating unreal or counter to reality things (like “if I were rich” – but I’m not).
In the past tense, there’s no “should” form but we can avoid “if” by inversion to achieve a more elegant style:
- “If I had been shown the document, I would have…” -> “Had I been shown the document…”
So just remember here to start your statement with “Had…”
May and Might
Let’s close with a quick look at these basic words. “May” denotes possibility, and “might” (originally the past tense of “may”) is basically the same but used for something which is less likely – so “we might go together” is less likely than “we may go together”. “May” is also used for permission – “you may leave now”. “Might” can also be used here, but has the effect of softening the statement to gentle advice – “you might want to bring a coat”.
And my favourite form – “might” used to express a hypothetical situation in the past, something that didn’t happen, a missed opportunity, with a touch of regret or even blame that it didn’t come to pass:
- “We might have gone together!”
- “You might have warned me!”