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167
A series of successive events is intensely rendered by a homosyndetic construction formed with the help of
the conjunctive then. E.g.:
You saw the flash, then heard the crack, then saw the smoke ball distort and thin in the wind (E.
Hemingway).
Another conjunctive pattern used in homosyndetic semi-compounding is the or-type in its different variants.
E.g.:
After dinner we sat in the yard of the inn on hard chairs, or paced about the platform or stumbled between
the steel sleepers of the permanent way (E. Waugh). Babies never cried or got
the wind or were sick when
Nurse Morrison fed them (M. Dickens).
By heterosyndetik semi-compounding the parts of the sentence are divided into groups according to the
meanings of the conjunctives. Cf.:
A native woman in a sarong came and looked at them, but vanished when the doctor addressed her (S.
Maugham). Ugly sat in the bow and barked arrogantly at passing boats, or stood rockily peering in the river
(M. Dickens).
The asyndetic connections in semi-compound sentences, within their range of functions, are very expressive,
especially when making up long enumerations-gradations. E.g.:
He had enjoyed a sharp little practice in Split, had meddled before the war in anti-Serbian politics, had
found himself in an Italian prison, had been let out when the partisans briefly "liberated" the coast, had been
swept up with them in the retreat (E. Waugh).
In the mixed syndetic-asyndetic semi-compound sentence various groupings of coordinated parts are
effected. E.g.:
He spun completely round, then fell forward on his knees, rose again and limped slowly on (E. Waugh).
In cases where multi-base semi-compound sentences are formed around one and the same subject-predicate
combination, they are very often primitivized into a one-predicate sentence with coordinated secondary parts.
Of these sentences, a very characteristic type is presented by a construction with a string of adverbial groups.
This type of sentence expresses an action (usually, though not necessarily, a movement) or a series of actions
continued through a sequence of consecutive place and time situations. E.g.:
Then she took my hand, and we went down the steps of the tower together, and through the court and to the
walls of the rock-place (D. du Maurier).
The construction is very dynamic, its adverbial constituents preserve clear traces of the corresponding
predications, and therefore it approaches the genuine semi-compound sentence of predicate coordination by its
semantic nature.
§ 6. The semi-compound sentence of predicate coordination immediately correlates with a compound
sentence of complete composition having identical subjects. Both constructions are built upon the same set of
base sentences, use the same connective means and reflect the same situation. E.g.:
She looked at him and saw again the devotion, the humility in his eyes. > She looked at him and she saw
again the devotion, the humility in his eyes (The latter sentence - from D. du Maurier). The officer received the
messengers, took their letters, and though I stood with them, completely ignored me. > The officer received
the messengers, took their letters, and though I stood with them, he completely ignored me (The latter sentence
- from H.E. Stover).
A question arises whether the compared sentences are absolutely the same in terms of functions and
semantics, or whether there is some kind of difference between them which causes them to be used
discriminately.
In an attempt to expose the existing functional difference between the two constructions, it has been pointed
out that base sentences with identical subjects are connected not into a semi-compound, but into a compound
sentence (of complete composition) in the three main cases: first, when the leading sentence is comparatively
long; second, when the finite verbs in the two sentences are of different structure; third, when the second
sentence is highly emotional.* These tentative formulations should rather be looked upon as practical guides,
for they do correspond to the existing tendencies of living speech. But the tendencies lack absolute regularity
and, which is far more significant, they do not present complete lingual facts by themselves, but rather are
particular manifestations of a general and fundamental mechanism at work. This mechanism is embodied in the
actual division of the sentence: as a matter of fact, observations of the relevant contexts show that the structure
of the actual division in the two types of sentences is essentially different. Namely, whereas the actual division
of the compound sentence with identical subjects presents two (or more) separate informative perspectives
characterized by identical themes and different rhemes, the actual division of the semi-compound sentence
presents only one perspective, analysed into one theme and one, though complex, rheme; the latter falls into