Timeline for The past form of "must"
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
6 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Feb 25 at 12:31 | comment | added | Mari-Lou A | @brilliant My answer says and explains quite clearly that the tense in "must forget everything" is present and why it is used appropriately in this case. I don't see any answer that mentions deontic or epistemic must. I also supplied a reliable and authoritative source for "deontic necessity" but that doesn't satisfy you either. This is my last comment on the matter. Thank you in any case for editing the question and providing the original source and also for changing your edited version with the original. Once I read that everything began to click into place. | |
| Feb 25 at 12:23 | comment | added | brilliant | gotube's post also uses reliable and credible resource - the only reason why he didn't provide the link to the Wikipedia chart on modals is because I had already added that link to my original question. Your point on justifying "said" in the passage (as opposed to "say") still needs a resource confirming that switching to the historical past right in the middle of a sentence, especially right after "said", is acceptable. | |
| Feb 25 at 12:15 | comment | added | Mari-Lou A | @brilliant so you agree (in part) with my analysis, this makes me happy. But I also said “… it would have been easier to see why "must“ was kept", say might have been preferable (at least to me) but it's not wrong to use "said" in that context, the author of the piece is switching tenses to enhance the drama of the situation. Lastly, before we get into an argument of which I have no time to enter, this the only post which uses reliable and credible resources to support their answer. | |
| Feb 25 at 12:10 | history | edited | Mari-Lou A | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added graph and link
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| Feb 25 at 12:08 | comment | added | brilliant | "The original text uses “said" but if the author had written "say" it would have been..." - If the author had written "say" this whole question would have never been posted because the historical present in the passage would have been absolutely clear to me, in which case "must" would have been absolutely grammatical. | |
| Feb 25 at 11:45 | history | answered | Mari-Lou A | CC BY-SA 4.0 |