He or it
Just finished Karin Fossum's Don't Look Back (translated by Felicity David). It's pretty good, and I'll be reading more. But at the end there's a sentence that struck me as odd. The protagonist, Konrad Sejer, is out with his daughter's family, and observing his grandson:
Matteus was scurrying around, full of anticipation, a killer whale in his arms, made of black and white felt. His name was Free Willy, and it was almost as big as he was.The mix of pronouns in that last sentence seems off to me. The sentence is hard to understand. I realize that "he was almost as big as he was" is worse, but I think I'd have written, "Its name...". If it just had to be "his name", then I'd have finished with "almost as big as the boy."
Does it seem odd to anyone else?
Labels: language, translation
4 Comments:
-
At 6:12 PM, November 25, 2008
Anonymous had this to say...
-
-
At 7:45 PM, November 25, 2008
Anonymous had this to say...
-
-
At 9:16 PM, November 25, 2008
The Ridger, FCD had this to say...
-
-
At 9:29 PM, November 25, 2008
AbbotOfUnreason had this to say...
-
-
<-- Older Post ^ Home Newer Post -->I agree with you. Referring to the same subject with two different pronouns within one sentence is odd.
Weird? Well, yes and no. I have to say, the sentence didn't stand out for me until you mentioned it, and then I could see how awkward it potentially was. But then I've become inured to the misuse of "their" as a gender-inclusive singular pronoun; I even use it regularly myself. Perhaps that's not so much ignorance as it is putting political correctness ahead of the grammatical. Anyway, the "he/it" example you quote doesn't seem too confusing. Perhaps contintual repetition will move usages like these over into the acceptable camp. After all, no one favors "it is I" over the incorrect and once shockingly uncouth "it's me." And the debate will rage on!
I'm glad you're "inured" to indefinite they, since it's always been the English way and long predates political correctness, but that's not the same as this. Calling the whale "he" and then in the next clause using "it" makes you (me, anyway) that there is some other entity around.
I agree with you. Either the whale is gendered or not. We usually don't use "it" in a way that refers to gendered beings, especially when we know what the gender is. I don't like that sentence. I do not like it, Sam I am.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]