how did he arrive?

[svartnik]

Hello

Is there a fault in my reasoning?

He arrived home safe.
This sentence means he was unhurt at the time of arrival.

How did he arrive? How did he reach his home? So ... that he was unhurt.

He arrived home safe.
He arrived home so(how?) that he was safe.

I say,

He arrived home safe may be intepreted as the ellipted version of
He arrived home (so that he was) safe.

Do you disagree?

[Casiopea]

Why the interpretation? Isn't arrived home safe meaningful as is? Or are you working from within a prescriptive framework; i.e., arrived safely, not *arrived safe?

...so that doesn't seem to fit. Could you explain your argument a bit more?

[svartnik]

Why the interpretation? Isn't arrived home safe meaningful as is? Or are you working from within a prescriptive framework; i.e., arrived safely, not *arrived safe?

...so that doesn't seem to fit. Could you explain your argument a bit more?

Casiopeia

I just wanted to make someone understand the meaning of the sentence:
(H)e arrived home safe.

I told her by removing the bracketed words in the sentence (H)e arrived home (so that he was) safe, meaning remains intact.

Did I mislead her?

The problem is, for most students, myself also included, the ellipted sentence has odd syntax. The adjective is far removed from what it modifies. The subject '(H)e' is felt out of the range of the adjective's action.

My question is, do the sentences coincide in meaning?
Thanks.

Cheers,

S

[Casiopea]

There are more than several ways to interpret what's going on syntactically and semantically--as you well know from your previous thread on the same topic.


If I were explaining that particular contruct to a student, I'd offer:

He arrived home safe;he was careful to avoid or avoided danger on his way home.

[svartnik]

There are more than several ways to interpret what's going on syntactically and semantically--as you well know from your previous thread on the same topic.


If I were explaining that particular contruct to a student, I'd offer:

He arrived home safe;he was careful to avoid or avoided danger on his way home.

Thanks Casiopeia,

My last question on this, is there any difference in meaning between #1 and #2?

1. He arrived home safe.
2. He arrived home so that he was safe.

Could they mean the same?

[Casiopea]

They differ slighty.

1. He arrived home safe.
He avoided danger on his way home. Home might not be safe;
i.e., he arrived home safe but found a hunger python in his livingroom.

2. He arrived home so that he was safe / in order to be safe.
Interpretation 1: his way home wasn't safe, but his home was a safe place.
Interpretation 2: he took great care to avoid danger on his way home.

Does that help?

[Casiopea]

svartnik, would you provide the link to the related thread of yours that provides the different linguistic interpretations for safe versus safely. I'm most certain, given the previous post, that it will add to the discussion here.

All the best