| 词组 | try and |
| 释义 | try and The use of try and in contexts where try to would be possible has been subject to criticism since the 19th century. The issue continues to enjoy great popularity, although a number of usage commentators, including Fowler 1926, Evans 1957, and Follett 1966, are on record as recognizing that try and is an established standard idiom. Copperud 1980 remarks about one complicated attempt to differentiate between try and and try to, "This proves nothing but the lengths to which the wrongheaded will go to make nonexistent points." The basis for objecting to try and is usually the notion that try is to be followed by the infinitive combined with the assumption that an infinitive requires to. This is the same mistaken assumption that has caused so much trouble over the so-called split infinitive (which see). In spite of what these critics believe, however, infinitives are used in many constructions without to, and some of those constructions use and. The use of and between two verbs where to might be expected {to would seem unlikely in some of the constructions) is an old one in English. The OED has examples back to the 16th century; the Middle English Dictionary has examples as far back as the 13th. The verbs most often used in this construction in past centuries were begin, go, take, and come—the last three of which are still so used. Try did not appear as try and until the 17th century, when our familiar sense of the word was first established. Interestingly, the earliest example for the "make an attempt" sense in the OED involves the try and construction, so try and may actually be older than try to. The oldest example of try to in the OED, in fact, is an inverted construction: • To repair his Strength he tries —John Dryden, Virgil's Georgics, 1697 Try and could not be used in an inverted construction. Try and, in fact, is not capable of much in the way of variation; it is almost always used in the fixed form try and followed by an infinitive. If you inflect try, insert an adverb, or invert the construction, you will use try to. (It may be noteworthy that the earliest criticism of try and we have seen is by a reviewer for Rout ledge's Magazine, October 1864, in a review reprinted in Moon 1865. The reviewer ridicules Dean Alford's use of try and in a magazine article by inflecting it to tries and, which he finds, of course, impossible.) In the next example, notice how Herbert Read has had to switch constructions in order to use trying: • ... to try and keep it alive by State patronage is like trying to keep the dodo alive in a zoo —Herbert Read, The Philosophy of Modern Art, 1952 And Henry Adams, not averse to try and (as a later example will demonstrate), has to use try to when he slips in an adverb: • ... I like the girls and try always to be polite — Henry Adams, letter, 7 June 1859 A negative may precede try and, but if a negative follows try, to is used: • ... when you are on your moorings, don't try and get into her —Peter Heaton, Cruising, 1952 • Not to try and keep either a diary or careful income tax records —And More by Andy Rooney, 1982 • Try not to take her out shopping —nurse quoted in McCall's, March 1971 These restrictions give native speakers no problem whatever, but if you are a learner of English, you will want to keep them in mind. A popular misconception among those who disparage try and is that the construction has only recently become widespread: • "I'll try and see" is now universal in the spoken language, and is now spreading into print —Patrick Brogan, Encounter, February 1975 But try and has actually been common in print for about a century and a half, as the following garland of examples amply shows. You will observe that most of the examples are not from highly formal styles; many are from speech and fictional speech and from familiar letters: • Now I will try and write of something else —Jane Austen, letter, 29 Jan. 1813 • 'Stand aside, my dear,' replied Squeers. 'We'll try and find out.' —Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, 1839 • The unfortunate creature has a child still every year, and her constant hypocrisy is to try and make her girls believe that their father is a respectable man — W. M. Thackeray, The Book of Snobs, 1846 • "I am going to try and tack it with a kiss, sister,— there! ..." —Herman Melville, Pierre, 1852 • ... to try and soften his father's anger —George Eliot, Silas Marner, 1861 (in Hall 1917) • Do try and send me a little news —Henry Adams, letter, 18 Dec. 1863 • "O, go 'long with you, Tom, before you aggravate me again. And you try and see if you can't be a good boy, for once " —Mark Twain, Tom Sawyer, 1876 • We are getting rather mixed. The situation entangled. Let's try and comb it out —W. S. Gilbert, The Gondoliers, 1889 • If gentlemen sold their things, he was to try and get them to sell to him —Samuel Butler, The Way of All Flesh, 1903 • ... the best method to use in giving out these hints is to try and describe my own personal procedure — Ring Lardner, preface, How to Write Short Stories, 1924 • ... it induced e.g. Hobbes to try and make political science a geometry —Harold J. Laski, letter, 1 Mar. 1925 • "... Come on there, try and sit still a minute and answer my question " —F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby, 1925 • I'm going to try and see him today —E. B. White, letter, August 1936 • "I'll try and push this thing through in my own way." —Morley Callaghan, The Loved and the Lost, 1951 • ... they have lost the will to try and live better — Enid Bagnold, Harper's, August 1952 • I am glad of the opportunity to try and get this point cleared up —William Empson, Essays in Criticism, July 1953 • Try and read Scribe and you will be bored —Eric Bentley, New Republic, 23 May 1955 • As long as there are empty seats at baseball and basketball games, it seems only sensible to try and fill them —Pete Axthelm, New York, 30 Aug. 1971 • He always dressed rapidly, so as to try and conserve his night warmth till the sun rose —Doris Lessing, reprinted in Literature Lives (9th grade text), ed. Hanna Beate Haupt et al., 1975 • ... and Issy who has to try and outwit his own electronic burglar alarm system when he wants to raid the refrigerator in the middle of the night —David Lodge, Times Literary Supp., 26 Sept. 1980 • Let every reader try and remember this —Jonathan Spence, N.Y. Times Book Rev., 4 Oct. 1987 These examples show that try and has been socially acceptable for these two centuries but that it is not used in an elevated style. Quite a few commentators lump try and with other constructions in which and replaces a possible to. Go and (which see) is the oldest of these, dating back to the 13th century. It has always been respectable in speech and casual writing: • But I sought after George Psalmanazar the most. I used to go and sit with him at an alehouse in the city —Samuel Johnson, quoted in James Boswell, Life of Samuel Johnson, 1791 • There! I may now finish my letter and go and hang myself —Jane Austen, letter, 24 Dec. 1798 • I must go and see him again —Lord Byron, journal entry, 1 Dec. 1813 • When you are puzzled, go and tell your puzzle to your Heavenly Father —Lewis Carroll, letter, 26 Dec. 1889 • I have been leaving Franconia, New Hampshire ... to go and live in South Shaftsbury, Vermont —Robert Frost, letter, 10 Oct. 1920 Unlike try and, go and can be inflected, as in these constructions: • ... and he went and sat on a stone —Kay Cicellis, Encounter, March 1955 • I went and saw the Allen Brothers in a free concert —Rick Stacy, quoted in Bluegrass Unlimited, July 1982 Come and is also old, and equally respectable: • ... desired I would come and see her —Jonathan Swift, Journal to Stella, 2 Feb. 1711 • I was meditating to come and see you —Charles Lamb, letter, 4 Mar. 1830 • ... I would come and see you tomorrow —Lewis Carroll, letter, 14 July 1877 Be sure and is also frequently encountered: • And be sure and get tested for sheep blast —James Thurber, letter, 1937 • Be sure and wear gloves —Kenneth A. Henderson, Handbook of American Mountaineering, 1942 • You've got to get every Protestant in this outfit to be sure and be there at that mass —Harry S. Truman, quoted in Merle Miller, Plain Speaking, 1973 There are a few other verbs that turn up with and where to could have been used: • He didn't have to stop and think about his answer —Elmer Davis, But We Were Born Free, 1954 • And you can tell your daddy that someday I'll be President of this country. You watch and see —Lyndon B. Johnson, quoted in Sam Houston Johnson, My Brother Lyndon, 1970 • If you want to write, start and write down your thoughts —Leacock 1943 About the only thing that can be held against any of these combinations is that they seem to be more typical of speech than of high-toned writing—and that is hardly a sin. The judgment of try and in Fowler 1926 remains eminently sensible today: • It is an idiom that should be not discountenanced, but used when it comes natural. |
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