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At 21:06 16/07/2013 -0400, Mark LaPierre wrote:
As long as we are going to entertain off topic, how about this.

[One] common figure of speech in English is the use of "Try and" where the meaning is "Try to". I.E. I'm going to try and drive my car backwards for three miles. When I see it, or hear it, I wonder, "Are they going to try the car, or are they going to drive the car?" Make up my mind!

I have to say I also prefer "try to" to "try and", but Henry Fowler says of the figure of speech given the classy Greek name "hendiadys" (or one-through-two):

... 'nice and warm', 'try and do better', 'grace and favour', instead of 'nicely warm', 'try to do better', 'gracious favour' are true examples.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hendiadys . Advertisers use it when they claim their product is "new and improved" (which is a contradiction), meaning "newly improved".

Brian Barker


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