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81
Testing for the perfect giving prominence to the expression of priority in retrospective coordination will be
represented as follows: > I have been thinking over the suggestion for a week or two now.
Testing for the perfect giving prominence to the expression of succession in retrospective coordination will
be made thus: > Since the time the suggestion was made I have been thinking it over.
Finally, testing for the continuous giving prominence to the expression of action in progress will include
expansion: > Since the suggestion was made I have been thinking it over continually.
Naturally, both perfect indefinite and perfect continuous, being categorially characterized by their respective
features, in normal use are not strictly dependent on a favourable contextual environment and can express their
semantics in isolation from adverbial time indicators. Cf:.
Surprisingly, she did not protest, for she had given up the struggle (M. Dickens). "What have you been
doing down there?" Miss Peel asked him. "I've been looking for you all over the play-ground" (M. Dickens).
The exception is the future perfect that practically always requires a contextual indicator of time due to the
prospective character of posteriority, of which we have already spoken.
It should be noted that with the past perfect the priority principle is more distinct than with the present
perfect, which again is explained semantically. In many cases the past perfect goes with the lexical indicators
of time introducing the past plane as such in the microcontext. On the other hand, the transmissive semantics of
the perfect can so radically take an upper hand over its priority semantics even in the past plane that the form is
placed in a peculiar expressive contradiction with a lexical introduction of priority. In particular, it concerns
constructions introduced by the subordinative conjunction before. Cf:.
It was his habit to find a girl who suited him and live with her as long as he was ashore. But he had
forgotten her before the anchor had come dripping out of the water and been made fast. The sea was his home
(J. Tey).
§ 9. In keeping with the general tendency, the category of retrospective coordination can be contextually
neutralized, the imperfect as the weak member of the opposition filling in the position of neutralization. Cf:.
"I feel exactly like you," she said, "only different, because after all I didn't produce him; but. Mother,
darling, it's all right..." (J. Galsworthy). Christine nibbled on Oyster Bienville. "I always thought it was because
they spawned in summer" (A. Hailey).
In this connection, the treatment of the lexemic aspective division of verbs by the perfect is,
correspondingly, the reverse, if less distinctly pronounced, of their treatment by the continuous. Namely, the
expression of retrospective coordination is neutralized most naturally and freely with limitive verbs. As for the
unlimitive verbs, these, b being used in the perfect, are rather turned into "limitive for the nonce". Cf;.
"I'm no beaten rug. I don't need to feel like one. I’ve been a teacher all my life, with plenty to show for it"
(A. Hailey).
Very peculiar neutralizations take place between the forms of the present perfect-imperfect. Essentially
these neutralizations signal instantaneous subclass migrations of the verb from a limitive to an unlimitive one.
Cf:.
Where do you come from? (i.e. What is the place of your origin?) I put all my investment in London, (i.e. I
keep all my money there.)
Characteristic colloquial neutralizations affect also some verbs of physical and mental perceptions. Cf:.
I forget what you've told me about Nick. I hear the management has softened their stand after all the hurly-
burly!
The perfect forms in these contexts are always possible, being the appropriate ones for a mode of expression
devoid of tinges of colloquialism.
§
10. The categorial opposition "perfect versus imperfect" is broadly represented in verbids. The verbid
representation of the opposition, though, is governed by a distinct restrictive regularity which may be
formulated as follows: the perfect is used with verbids onty in semantically strong positions, i.e. when its
categorial meaning is made prominent. Otherwise the opposition is neutralized, the imperfect being used in the
position of neutralization. Quite evidently this regularity is brought about by the intermediary lexico-
grammatical features of verbids, since the category of retrospective coordination is utterly alien to the non-
verbal parts of speech. The structural neutralization of the opposition is especially distinct with the present
participle of the limitive verbs, its indefinite form very naturally expressing priority in the perfective sense. Cf.:
She came to Victoria to see Joy off, and Freddy Rigby came too, bringing a crowd of the kind of young
people Rodney did not care for (M. Dickens).