1. The man who drives the car every day is my brother.
2. The man driving the car every day is my brother.
3. The man who drove the car yesterday was my brother.
4. The man driving the car yesterday was my brother.
5. The boy who brings the milk has been ill.
6. The boy bringing the milk has been ill.
7. A tile which fell from a roof shattered into fragments.
8. A tile falling from a roof shattered into fragments.
9. The boy who brings the milk every morning has been ill.
10. The boy bringing the milk every morning has been ill.
Do 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 have the same meanings as 2, 4, 6, 8, 10
respectively?
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Generally speaking, a reduced relative clause represents only a progressive
form, hence the semantic non-correspondence of 6 to 5.
Regarding the other pairs, while it would be acceptable to say [The man who is
driving the car every day...], since the act of driving can be seen as
extending over a long period, perhaps even most of the day, [?The boy who is
bringing the milk every morning...] is strange, since the delivering of milk (
at least from the speaker's viewpoint) would normally be conceived of as a
simple act of relatively short duration, not therefore naturally expressed via
the progressive, hence the relative unacceptability of 10. Essentially, then,
especially if you wish to avoid potentially difficult and possibly even
culturally-based judgment calls relating to verbal aspect, the 'rule' is
simple: do not attempt to use reduced clauses unless intending to represent a
progressive meaning. While there may be any number of syntactically possible
exceptions to this, not all will necessarily be inherently natural or
contextually appropriate.
http://0rz.tw/cf5dX
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※ 編輯: sitifan 來自: 118.169.184.135 (12/27 08:17)