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63
colloquial English is, in general, not an unusual feature. Observing textual materials, we may come across cases
of subject-wanting predicative units used not only singly, as part of curt question-response exchange, but also in
a continual chain of speech. Here is an example of a chain of this type taken from E. Hemingway:
"No one shot from cars," said Wilson coldly.
"I mean chase them from cars."
"Wouldn't ordinarily," Wilson said. "Seemed sporting enough to me though while we were doing it. Taking
more chance driving that way across the plain full of holes and one thing and another than hunting on foot.
Buffalo could have charged us each time we shot if he liked. Gave him every chance. Wouldn't mention it to
any one though. It's illegal if that's what you mean."
However, examples like this cannot be taken for a disproof of the obligatory connection between the verb
and its subject, because the corresponding subject-nouns, possibly together with some other accompanying
words, are zeroed on certain syntactico-stylistical principles (brevity of expression in familiar style,
concentration on the main informative parts of the communication, individual speech habits, etc.). Thus, the
distinct zero-representation of the subject does give expression to the verbal person-number category even in
conditions of an outwardly gaping void in place of the subject in this or that concrete syntactic construction
used in the text. Due to the said zero-representation, we can easily reconstruct the implied person indications in
the cited passage: "I wouldn't ordinarily"; "It seemed sporting enough"; "It was taking more chance driving that
way"; "We gave him every chance"; "I wouldn't mention it to any one".
Quite naturally, the non-use of the subject in an actual utterance may occasionally lead to a referential
misunderstanding or lack of understanding, and such situations are reflected in literary works by writers -
observers of human speech as well as of human nature. A vivid illustration of this type of speech informative
deficiency can be seen in one of K. Mansfield's stories:
"Fried or boiled?" asked the bold voice.
Fried or boiled? Josephine and Constantia were quite bewildered for the moment. They could hardly take it
in.
"Fried or boiled what, Kate?" asked Josephine, trying to begin to concentrate.
Kate gave a loud sniff. "Fish."
"Well, why didn't you say so immediately?" Josephine reproached her gently. "How could you expect us to
understand, Kate? There are a great many things in this world, you know, which are fried or boiled."
The referential gap in Kate's utterance gave cause to her bewildered listener for a just reproach. But such
lack of positive information in an utterance is not to be confused with the non-expression of a grammatical
category. In this connection, the textual zeroing of the subject-pronoun may be likened to the textual zeroing of
different constituents of classical analytical verb-forms, such as the continuous, the perfect, and others: no
zeroing can deprive these forms of their grammatical, categorial status.
Now, it would be too strong to state that the combination of the subject-pronoun with the finite verb in
English has become an analytical person-number form in the full sense of this notion. The English subject-
pronoun, unlike the French conjoint subject-pronoun (e.g. Je vous remercie - "I thank you"; but: mon mari et
moi - "my husband and I"), still retains its self-positional syntactic character, and the personal pronominal
words, without a change of their nominative form, are used in various notional functions in sentences, building
up different positional sentence-parts both in the role of head-word and in the role of adjunct-word. What we
do see in this combination is, probably, a very specific semi-analytical expression of a reflective grammatical
category through an obligatory syntagmatic relation of the two lexemes: the lexeme-reflector of the category
and the lexeme-originator of the category. This mode of grammatical expression can be called "junctional". Its
opposite, i.e. the expression of the categorial content by means of a normal morphemic or word-morphemic
procedure, can be, by way of contrast, tentatively called "native". Thus, from the point of view of the
expression of a category either through the actual morphemic composition of a word, or through its being
obligatorily referred to another word in a syntagmatic string, the corresponding grammatical forms will be
classed into native and junctional. About the person-numerical forms of the finite verb in question we shall say
that in the ordinary case of the third person singular present indicative, the person and number of the verb are
expressed natively, while in most of the other paradigmatic locations they are expressed junctionally, through
the obligatory reference of the verb-form to its subject.
This truth, not incapable of inviting an objection on the part of the learned, noteworthily has been exposed
from time immemorial in practical grammar books, where the actual conjugation of the verb is commonly given
in the form of pronoun-verb combinations: I read, you read, he reads, we read, you read, they read.