3 ms·
Guessing they meant "I have never read" and not telling you to "never read"
by tslater2006 3y ago
Guessing they meant "I have never read" and not telling you to "never read"
- jen729w 3y agoI find myself writing like this all the time. I omit the 'I', writing it like I say it. Then I read back my own words and invariably insert the 'I' as I realise it doesn't make sense.
- stefncb 3y agoIn this particular instance you'd have to disambiguate with "I have" or "I had", I alone would mean the wrong thing.
- schoen 3y ago"Read" is a particularly unlucky verb for this because its past participle and imperative form are written the same way. Most other English verbs wouldn't have this particular ambiguity. "Never eaten a Carolina Reaper pepper, but I'm looking forward to my first time." "Never eat a Carolina Reaper pepper; you'll regret it." Wiktionary has a few dozen irregular verbs that could produce an ambiguity like this one: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:English_irregular_verbs_categories#Group_-_1_No_variation https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:English_irregular_ve... "Never miscast Magic Missile ..." "Never shut a door on someone's finger ..." "Never preset the thermostat to 90 °F before going on vacation..." "Never put an irregular verb in a position where readers might interpret it ambiguously..." ("... but there's a first time for everything, I guess" / "... you won't be happy with the results")