yo4561 Wrote:Happy happy Saturday my friends,
I came across this example in the All the Verbal book:
"The scientist ANNOUNCED that the supercollider WAS READY, that it HAD not COST too much to build, and that it WOULD PROVIDE new insights into the workings of the universe."
Isn't it repetitive to repeat the "that" before "it had" and "it would"? In other words, wouldn't it read "The scientist announced that the supercollider was ready, that that it had not cost too much to build, and that that it would provide...."?
Nope! In the book example, the repetition of "that" in all 3 list items means that the "that" is not part of the root phrase at all, thus no repetition. Here is it more visually; notice that the elements match (all are "that" + complete clauses).
The scientist ANNOUNCED...[the "that" is in all of the elements, so it is not in the root phrase]
(1) that the supercollider WAS READY,
(2) that it HAD not COST too much to build, and
(3) that it WOULD PROVIDE new insights into the workings of the universe.
yo4561 Wrote:Is the "that" needed because you would otherwise have a comma splice when you don't include the "that" with the "it had not cost too much to build" element of the sentence.... ("The scientist ANNOUNCED that the supercollider WAS READY, it HAD not COST too much to build, and it WOULD PROVIDE new insights into the workings of the universe.") I see how it would be okay to not include the "that" in the last element because you have the conjunction "and".
No, that would not be considered a comma splice, even for the 2nd list element, because in the "X, Y, and Z" structure, the first comma basically is understood to act like an "and." Thus, the sentence that you gave would be correct.
Correct: The scientist ANNOUNCED that the supercollider WAS READY, it HAD not COST too much to build, and it WOULD PROVIDE new insights into the workings of the universe.
Because here's the parallel structure; notice that the elements match (all are complete clauses).
The scientist ANNOUNCED that... [the "that" is in the root phrase, so it is not in any of the elements]
(1) the supercollider WAS READY,
(2) it HAD not COST too much to build, and
(3) it WOULD PROVIDE new insights into the workings of the universe.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I think what you are concerned about would be something like this:
Wrong: The scientist ANNOUNCED that the supercollider WAS READY, it HAD not COST too much to build, and that it WOULD PROVIDE new insights into the workings of the universe.
Can you see why this one is wrong?
