Quote:'I never heard of a time traveller who could summon time events.'; Robert looked at the girl. 'Let her rest. Maybe later, she can explain herself whatever is going on. I have to go now. Are you staying?'
'Yeah, I stay. Don't want to leave her alone.'

Grammarly tells me it should be to herself. I just want to stress she will explain herself and that there is no need to speculate about whatever it is.
Help. Who is wrong? Probably me, but I would like to understand.

Alexander Wrote:

What you have is correct grammatically, but I would suggest moving the reflexive pronoun:

Quote:'I never heard of a time traveller who could summon time events.'; Robert looked at the girl. 'Let her rest. Maybe later, she can explain whatever is going on herself. I have to go now. Are you staying?'

'Yeah, I'll stay. Don't want to leave her alone.'

If you keep the pronoun where it is, it sounds like the collocation explain oneself, as in to justify one's actions to someone else.

Consider also "I have never heard" or "I've never heard" at the beginning—the continuous is more natural in this context.

Grammarly struggles with... well, Grammarly struggles.

Thank you, that was perfect!

Alexander Wrote:

Why did I call it the continuous? That's the present perfect, Alexander.

words words wordsss

... is like adding and subtracting infinite, Lara's lack of comprehension of math is like... you know. Gosh, I suck at math.

That semicolon bothers me. 

luda305 Wrote: That semicolon bothers me.

Is okay, we all have a semi-colon in our lives

A semicolon is never used directly after a period or comma, that's its whole purpose, it is an either-or replacement. (unless it is used in Chicago or APA reference style, but I digress). You should choose either or to mark the end of the direct dialogue.

Mithradates Wrote: A semicolon is never used directly after a period or comma, that's its whole purpose, it is an either-or replacement. (unless it is used in Chicago or APA reference style, but I digress). You should choose either or to mark the end of the direct dialogue.

Thank you for the information, but this is one mark that, even wrong or right, is mine. If it bothers you, I am sorry. But most people on the forum already know what it means to me.

Not sure about being right ot wrong, but I would write it like this.

"I've never heard of a time traveller who could summon time events," Robert said while looking at the girl. "Let her rest for now. She can explain herlsef later. I have to go. Are you staying?"
"Yeah, I'll stay. Don't wanna leave her alone."

According to the single English grammar book I own (first published 1960 so might a bit outdated and is from Oxford press so a bit British) that sentence would indeed be incorrect.


If you use "herself" as emphasizing pronoun, it has to either be after the phrase it puts emphasis on or after all the objects.

So if you want to say she did the explaining an not someone else, it would be:

"She herself can explain whatever is going on."
or
"She can explain whatever is going on herself."

If you want to instead say she has to do it without help it would be:
"She can explain by herself whatever is going on."

If she was subject an target of the explaining (i.e. no one else it telling her, so she has to tell herself the explanation) it would be:
"She can explain to herself whatever is going on." (explains need a to, unlike e.g. warn or advise).

Then she could be what is explained, but then there would be no other object allowed:
"She can explain herself to us."  (i.e. tell us about herself).

Alexander Wrote:

I'd say there's no real semantic difference between any of the four possible placements. For the sentence

Quote:"She can explain whatever is going on."

I'd consider any of the following valid:

Quote:"She herself can explain whatever is going on."

"She can herself explain whatever is going on."

"She can explain whatever is going on herself."

"She can explain herself whatever is going on."

However, the final example—as Lara has above—is possible more common in speech than it is in writing. I'd naturally emphasise the pronoun if I spoke it aloud.

Of the first three, the third is possibly the most common and the second least. The first is to my ear very emphatic. I imagine a red-faced man shouting it. Someone perform a frequency analysis so we can all be proper research linguists.

I guess grammarly is more about written than spoken English. And the grammar book (which obviously is mostly only about written language) says only 1 and 3 are allowed while 2 and 4 are not. (Of course no grammar book will ever be always correct and language is always changing and slightly different for each speaker and country. So something not allowed by some grammar book is not inherently wrong, but it might still be best to avoid it if you want more potential readers to understand you.)

larareispoetry Wrote:

Mithradates Wrote: A semicolon is never used directly after a period or comma, that's its whole purpose, it is an either-or replacement. (unless it is used in Chicago or APA reference style, but I digress). You should choose either or to mark the end of the direct dialogue.

Thank you for the information, but this is one mark that, even wrong or right, is mine. If it bothers you, I am sorry. But most people on the forum already know what it means to me.

Just to check out of curiosity, you misuse semicolons intentionally as part of your story?  Many famous authors have intentionally broken rules in the past so I won't judge, but I'm just wondering.

James Wrote: Just to check out of curiosity, you misuse semicolons intentionally as part of your story?

Alexander Wrote:

James Wrote: Just to check out of curiosity, you misuse semicolons intentionally as part of your story?

a b s o l u t e

c h a d

Yes, it is part of all my stories, semi-colons are used on dialogue tags in my native language. The use of it is pretty much consistent. I use it to separate dialogue from quick actions. And also, since semi-colon is a landmark in my life it is also my very unique writing style no matter what language I write or what I'm writing (also use it on poetry)