This construction is puzzling me...
I wrote the following in a book review:
“How about a return to the days when women were in such vulnerable and inferior positions, they were easier to take advantage of by powerful men who knew they could get away with it?”
That bit “they were easier to take advantage of by powerful men ...” doesn’t sit right with me, but I can’t figure out why. Am I just imagining it, or is there a problem?
CQ (unregistered)
April 21, 2005, 9:21am
You need a passive--
"they were easier TAKEN advantage of"
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Persephone Imytholin (unregistered)
April 21, 2005, 9:32am
Recast the entire last clause as 'when it was easier for powerful men, who knew they could get away with it, to take advantage of them'
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speedwell2
April 21, 2005, 9:36am
Persephone and I are on the same page, but I'd make a slight additional change and say, "How about a return to the days when women were in such vulnerable and inferior positions, that it was easier for powerful men, who knew they could get away with it, to take advantage of them?"
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Anonymous (unregistered)
April 21, 2005, 9:40am
Note the pronoun confusion in the last example, though (they/them).
A more invasive recasting of the sentence might go something like:
"How about a return to the days when women were so vulnerable that it was easier for powerful to take advantage of them with impunity?"
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speedwell2
April 21, 2005, 9:40am
Anonymous was me, sorry....
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Persephone Imytholin (unregistered)
April 21, 2005, 9:42am
Speedwell's phrasing is nice, but would be a little better without the first comma -> "How about a return to the days when women were in such vulnerable and inferior positions that it was easier for powerful men, who knew they could get away with it, to take advantage of them?"
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Persephone Imytholin (unregistered)
April 21, 2005, 9:44am
And this is what happens when people reply at the same time. Speedwell's latest attempt is nice, but there's an adjective desperately seeking a noun there.
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speedwell2
April 21, 2005, 2:02pm
(cries) I didn't actually miss that but I didn't want to post four times in a row.
Dyske, I wish we had a preview....
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Anonymous (unregistered)
June 17, 2005, 6:08am
You could say...
"How about a return to the days when women were in such vulnerable and inferior positions, where they were more easily taken advantage of by powerful men who knew they could get away with it?"
it's a little more casual than the sentence structure persephone gave althought that is very correct as well.
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joachim (unregistered)
June 24, 2005, 2:05pm
I don't really like this last construction. There's another thread discussing the (mis)use of "so" as an adverb and I believe "such" is used the same way here. Remove some of the extra verbiage and we're left with: "How about a return to the days when women were in such vulnerable and inferior positions?" That's not a correct sentence, IMO. I think allowing the second clause to be independent of the first breaks the sentence.
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