Need FReeper Help With English Grammar

MB26

[MindBender26]

Need help from a real English language maven:

Sentence in question is: "Larry Parks' day in court Monday didn't go half bad"

Is that correct, or is it "Larry Parks' day in court Monday didn't go half badly"?

Yeah, I know it's a lousy sentence in the first place, but I didn't write it.

Need someone who really knows English grammar for expert opinion.

Thanks

[bwteim]

But didn't suck too badly....

[Gumlegs]

It really depends on whether you're writing "natural-sounding dialogue," or you need show correct usage. "Half-bad" is the way people talk. "Half-badly" is correct English. "Half-badly" is modifying "day," telling you how the day went -- badly.

"The day went bad" would imply that, perhaps, the day joined a criminal gang, or had been kept past its expiration date.

The correct possessive is Parks's, by the way. (The possessive "Jesus'" is an exception to the rule).

[magoo_70115]

Well, the writer is using a double negative - didn't go half bad - that is an inauspicious beginning. It more properly should be "...went fairly well..." or "...all things considered, it went only half-badly..."

[lodwick]

lol

[SarahW]

The outcome of Larry Parks' day in court wasn't half-bad.

The experience of the day in court wasn't half-bad.

Larry Parks did not have a half-bad day in court.

Larry Parks' day in court did not turn out half-bad.

It did not go half so bad as it might have.

It could have been worse.

[Gumlegs]

No, it's not. It's modifying "went." What a moron. (It should still be "badly," though).

[ofMagog]

I got rich treating compulsive personalities...

[riley1992]

LOL. Works for me and no pesky rules to follow.

[Dog Gone]

The correct possessive is Parks's, by the way.

LOL. That was the first thing I noticed, and I was beginning to doubt whether anyone would ever mention it.

[Xenalyte]

The colloquialism using "half-bad" is that something "isn't/wasn't half-bad."

Are you allowed to revise at all? In this sentence, you can change "didn't go" to "wasn't" (and be sure to hyphenate), or change "half-bad" to "too badly" (my vote).

If your choice is changing the last word only, I'd stick with "bad" - but hyphenate it, for the love of Pete!

[Dog Gone]

By the way, the correct grammar for the sentence is

Larry Parks's day in court didn't suck as much as it could have.

[bwteim]

"Larry Parks' day in court Monday didn't go half bad"

It could have been worse.

Larry Parks was hanged until he was only half dead.

[Sid Rich]

Change "Larry Parks' day" to "Larry Parks's day".

The first rule in Strunk & White's "Elements of Style" is "Form the possessive singular of nouns by adding 's."

[stanz]

"Half bad" is the correct expression, but it's slang. "Half badly" is gramatically better, but you'd never use it, because the sentence is designed to go with the expression "half bad," and you'd never use a sentence like that if you were interested in proper grammar.

I agree.

[budwiesest]

The judge went easy on Larry, in court, on Monday?

[Sid Rich]

Several Strunk fans struck at once.

[Gumlegs]

You're right. I think there's (a contraction, not a possessive), more on the subject in Fowler.

[arthurus]

Sentence in question is: "Larry Parks' day in court Monday didn't go half bad" Is that correct, or is it "Larry Parks' day in court Monday didn't go half badly"?

Actually these constructions mean 2 slightly different things. The first means that "things" didn't rot entirely. The second means that "things" did better than they might have. Either might be correct, depending on how the writer characterizes the event.

The possssive of "Parks'" classically would be written "Parks's" unless one is referring to Larry and one or more relatives in which case it would be "Parkses'". However, the tendency now is to write plural possessives as they are spoken.

[Diamond]

Who is Larry Parks?

[George W. Bush]

badly