0

Let say that someone is not listening to your advise which is for his/her benefit and making a big mistake.

So can he say:

One day, you will crying remember my words!

Or 

One day, you will remember crying my words!

2
  • We say: "Don't come boohooing to me."
    – TimR
    Aug 13, 2015 at 23:02
  • "One day you will cry remembering my words."
    – lurker
    Jan 3, 2016 at 0:55

2 Answers 2

1

In the first rendering, "crying remember" is bad syntax. The placement of "crying" next to the verb "remember" cries out for an adverb. But "crying" applies to the person, not the remembering. That is:

[crying person] remembering

The second is definitely wrong because the second person did not "cry" the first person's words! (in "remember crying my words", remember is the verb, and crying my words is the direct object.)

In my opinion, the most concise, grammatically correct and accurate way to phrase this thought would be:

  • One day you will cry, remembering my words.

This means that he will cry and remember at the same time.

If you wish to stress that the remembering will trigger the crying, say

  • One day you will remember my words and cry.
1
  • 1
    Hmm, maybe you can throw in an explanation, no extra cost. Oct 13, 2015 at 6:19
0

The word that should precede remember is an adverb.

How will you remember my words? - cryingly

One day you will cryingly remember my words!

But I would say it this way, a more common way -

One day you will cry and remember my words!

9
  • Yes, remember and cry are two actions, but I mean one action only and second one as a quality of the action. Aug 13, 2015 at 16:36
  • Since you have the object "my words" after "remember", you can't have an adverb there, you need to keep them together for grammar's sake. You can put "cryingly" after "my words", but it changes the meaning, suggesting that the act of remembering is what will make the person cry, which is not what you intend to say. I recommend "One day, wiping away tears you will remember my words." Aug 13, 2015 at 19:05
  • @VictorBazarov I am not a native speaker. But I have noticed, very few though, that cryingly + verb + object form is there. But I found more examples of cryingly modifying an adjective than crying modifying a verb. So I just want to know what is correct? Or are both of them correct? Aug 15, 2015 at 4:55
  • It is quite possible that more than one order of words is fine (English is not so strict as is sometimes portrayed) and gives the same meaning. I can't say I've done enough research to authoritatively state one way or the other about the correctness of the use of "cryingly". As a matter of fact, as I type the word here, it is marked with a wavy red line to indicate that Internet Explorer's dictionary doesn't have it, from which I conclude that it's not a common word... Aug 15, 2015 at 12:27
  • @victor yes it's not that common. And so I in my answer wrote "the more common way..." etc. I have provided the link also in my answer that will take you to Wiktionary where it defines the word. Moreover OED and Collins have entry for that word :-) Aug 15, 2015 at 12:33

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .