Timeline for What does "he'd never meant any of it" mean in this context?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
10 events
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| Oct 24, 2018 at 9:01 | comment | added | Astralbee | @dan Now you say that, without any further context I agree it could mean either. However if it is "Fred's" opinion it was clearly based on what his father said about Lucius being in that "inner circle", so even in that case it is indirectly his father's thoughts. I haven't read Harry Potter, I'm an adult. :) | |
| Oct 24, 2018 at 0:37 | vote | accept | dan | ||
| Oct 23, 2018 at 23:56 | comment | added | dan | @Astralbee When you say "...his father thought the retraction was a "load of dung"...", do you mean "load of dung" was said by his father? I thought that was said by Fred, which might be the opinion of Fred's, instead of his father's. What do you think? | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 20:21 | comment | added | TimR | Is there anything in the quote to indicate that Malfoy was acting honorably and retracting words he had spoken in earnest, once he realized he was wrong? I don't see it. Rather, he seems to have been acting dodgy and saying that his words of support had never been in earnest in the first place. | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 19:43 | comment | added | Astralbee | @Tᴚoɯɐuo Yes, Lucius is claiming he wasn't sincere when he spoke the words (of support) originally, but the narrator's father believed that it was the retraction, not the original words, that was insincere. | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 19:32 | comment | added | TimR | "Lucius Malfoy came back saying he'd never meant any of it." is a report of what Malfoy was saying. What is being reported is that Malfoy was claiming that he had not been sincere when he said those words. He's not retracting his words. That would require an admission that he had been wrong to say them. Rather, he's saying that he wasn't sincere when he spoke them. | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 19:26 | comment | added | Astralbee | @Tᴚoɯɐuo Is a retraction not taking back one's words? Anyway, in this case, the narrator believes it is the retraction that is insincere. He goes on to say that his father thought the retraction was a "load of dung" and that Lucius was in You Know Who's inner circle. If it weren't for that detail then you might be right. | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 18:17 | comment | added | TimR | He's not really retracting his words. Rather, he's saying that he was not being genuine or sincere when he said them. | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 12:57 | comment | added | bukwyrm | perhaps the meaning of 'to mean sth.' is unclear - you might want to add it explicitly to your answer. I.e. 'to say something and mean it' > Saying something that includes either a belief that is dearly held, or a set of actions that the speaker is prepared to execute. | |
| Oct 23, 2018 at 12:20 | history | answered | Astralbee | CC BY-SA 4.0 |