If only it would rain.

[Phaedrus]

1) If only it would rain.
2) If only he would stop the invasion.
3) If only enrollment were higher.

I'm having students take a test in which they are to identify word strings (actual uses of English in Irving Shulman's West Side Story) as simple sentences, compound sentences, complex sentences, compound-complex sentences, fragments, or run-ons. I have used an "if only"-example ("If only his father had been alive to see the change.") as an example of a fragment.

I'm just interested to know whether you agree that such sentences are technically fragments. I plan to remind my students, at the outset of the exam, that if they find a fragment or a run-on, that doesn't necessarily mean that the sentence is "bad." In the case of "if only"-sentences, there is the sense of completeness even though, grammatically, they just consist of a dependent clause.

 

[jutfrank]

So what's the definition of 'fragment' that you've given them? If you're testing whether they can identify a fragment, you will have given them clear ways to do so, right?

What's the point of this test exactly? Are they EFL students?

 

[Phaedrus]

So what's the definition of 'fragment' that you've given them? If you're testing whether they can identify a fragment, you will have given them clear ways to do so, right?

A fragment is a sequence of words which is punctuated as if it were a sentence but which does not constitute or contain an independent clause.

What's the point of this test exactly? Are they EFL students?

The point of the test, which is for intermediate-high ESL students in an integrated reading-and-composition class at a California community college, is to see whether they can identify simple sentences, compound sentences, complex sentences, compound-complex sentences, fragments, and run-ons, an ability that I believe to be important to the extent that it can help learners cease to write fragments and run-ons in academic writing (except, in very exceptional cases, for rhetorical effect).

 

[jutfrank]

In that case, yes, it's a fragment as a it consists only of a dependent clause.

In what way do you think it might not be? (I don't think I see what you're getting at.)

 

[Phaedrus]

In that case, yes, it's a fragment as a it consists only of a dependent clause.

In what way do you think it might not be? (I don't think I see what you're getting at.)

The reason I find the fragmentariness of "if only"-sentences slightly debatable is that they do seem to stand alone as sentences, the ability to stand alone as a sentence being the hallmark of an independent clause. They are pragmatically self-sufficient as sentences while being grammatically deficient.

I suppose we could say that there is the ghostlike presence of an independent/matrix clause in the atmosphere of an "if only"-sentence, even if the independent/matrix clause can't be said to be elided. They are sentences that stand alone only by virtue of having a grammatical phantom limb, as it were.

 

[jutfrank]

The reason I find the fragmentariness of "if only"-sentences slightly debatable is that they do seem to stand alone as sentences, the ability to stand alone as a sentence being the hallmark of an independent clause. They are pragmatically self-sufficient as sentences while being grammatically deficient.

But they don't stand alone as sentences. They stand alone as utterances, but not sentences in the grammatical sense. When you say 'pragmatically self-sufficient as sentences', you mean utterances, not sentences.

I suppose we could say that there is the ghostlike presence of an independent/matrix clause in the atmosphere of an "if only"-sentence, even if the independent/matrix clause can't be said to be elided.

Yes, there is a ghostlike presence—an implicit consequence—that would logically be expressed with what would grammatically be termed an independent clause. But it isn't the grammar that's elided but the utterance of the consequence.

They are sentences that stand alone only by virtue of having a grammatical phantom limb, as it were.

As I say, I don't think it makes sense to say the phantom limb is 'grammatical'. It's just that the speaker doesn't want or need to utter the consequence.

 

[Phaedrus]

But they don't stand alone as sentences. They stand alone as utterances, but not sentences in the grammatical sense. When you say 'pragmatically self-sufficient as sentences', you mean utterances, not sentences.

Would you say the same thing about imperative sentences? Is a sentence like "Stop" not a (simple) sentence but just an utterance, on account of its missing an overt subject? We say that imperatives have an understood second-person subject, the existence of which can be demonstrated by the possibility of adding reflexive pronouns ("Stop yourself"); however, I don't think that any of us native speakers really feels the understood subject, "You," to be elided.

The reason I am questioning you about imperatives is that they feel just as complete to me as "If only"-sentences do, and, like "if only"-sentences, imperatives are missing something grammatically which does not seem actually to be elided. Imperatives are missing a subject, "if only"-sentences an independent/matrix clause. If the one type only attains to the status of "utterance" in your mind, perhaps the other type does, as well.

As you distinguish between sentence and utterance, is it possible to have an incomplete utterance in writing, just as it is possible to have an incomplete sentence in writing? I'm not sure that "if only"-sentences should be downgraded to utterances and deprived of sentential status, grammatically. They are full clauses, unlike such utterances as "Hello!" And although they are not attached to an independent clause, it is easy enough to postulate one.

If only it would rain [things would be much better].
If only he would stop the invasion [things would be much better].
If only enrollment were higher [things would be much better].

 

[5jj]

i don't agree that 'If only it would rain' is a dependent clause, though it may have the form of one. One can postulate an independent clause ('things would be much better'), but that is conjuring up something that isn't there. It seems to me that in terms of meaning, 'If only it would rain' has more in common with 'i wish it would rain' than with an implied conditional.

Utterances befinning with 'if only express an exclamatory wish (Quirk et al, 1985.842). This does not make them dependent on, or subordinate to, any other utterance. They are complete utterances, not fragments.

 

[jutfrank]

Would you say the same thing about imperative sentences? Is a sentence like "Stop" not a (simple) sentence but just an utterance, on account of its missing an overt subject?

I'd say it's a sentence, yes.

We say that imperatives have an understood second-person subject, the existence of which can be demonstrated by the possibility of adding reflexive pronouns ("Stop yourself"); however, I don't think that any of us native speakers really feels the understood subject, "You," to be elided.

I wouldn't like to say it's elided. I think it's better to say it's implied. That is to say that both speaker and hearer(s) know who it's directed at.

The reason I am questioning you about imperatives is that they feel just as complete to me as "If only"-sentences do, and, like "if only"-sentences, imperatives are missing something grammatically which does not seem actually to be elided. Imperatives are missing a subject, "if only"-sentences an independent/matrix clause. If the one type only attains to the status of "utterance" in your mind, perhaps the other type does, as well.

I just meant that if you're going to define it as a sentence fragment based on its consisting solely of an independent clause, then that seems clear enough it's not a sentence. Honestly, I don't think in terms of grammar. I think it's much more useful to say that if only sentences are logically incomplete. It's the utterance of the logic that is missing when a speaker fails to follow with a consequence. Saying that there's some 'grammar' missing is really to say that there's some logic missing. Perhaps we have different ideas about what grammar actually is.

As you distinguish between sentence and utterance, is it possible to have an incomplete utterance in writing, just as it is possible to have an incomplete sentence in writing?

The first case that comes to mind is where the writer wants to show that there's an interrup—

I'm not sure that "if only"-sentences should be downgraded to utterances and deprived of sentential status, grammatically. They are full clauses, unlike such utterances as "Hello!"

To be clear, I didn't mean to say that utterances are not sentences. Utterances are not defined by grammar in any way.

 

[jutfrank]

Utterances befinning with 'if only express an exclamatory wish (Quirk et al, 1985.842). This does not make them dependent on, or subordinate to, any other utterance. They are complete utterances, not fragments.

I think this is the bit that we can usefully discuss. Is there an implied consequence or not in if only utterances? My view is that unlike I wish utterances, there is. The dependence (the feeling of incompleteness) lies in the logical relation between condition and consequence.

 

[5jj]

'If only' can intruduce the apodosis, a dependent/subordinate clause in conditional sentences,, when it indicates something like a wish for the satisfaction of the condition:

i. He would get a distinction if only he would buckle down to some hard work.
ii.I could have solved the proble myself if only I'd had a little more time.. (Huddleston & Pullum, 2002.753.

H & P go on to say The wish meaning is particularly evident when the apodosis is omitted; If only I'd had more time.

I don't entirely agree. I feel that the wish meaning (with the accompanying idea of regret at the non-satisfaction) is paramount in that utterance - which admittedly has exactly the same form as the protasis of a conditional sentence..


[This identity of form for different utterance is not uncommon in conditional sentences as we see here:

iii. If Andrea cooks, I will wash up.
iv. If Andrea cooked, I would wash up.

[iii) could be a predictive utterance referring to a future time situation (the traditional 'firs' condition), or a factual contion referring to a general-time situation.
[1v] could be a factual utterance about a past-time situation, a counterfactual utterance about a general-time situation, or a hypothetcal utterance about a future-time situation.]

 

[Phaedrus]

'If only' can intruduce the apodosis . . . when it indicates something like a wish for the satisfaction of the condition:

. . . H & P go on to say The wish meaning is particularly evident when the apodosis is omitted; If only I'd had more time.

I don't entirely agree. I feel that the wish meaning (with the accompanying idea of regret at the non-satisfaction) is paramount in that utterance - which admittedly has exactly the same form as the protasis of a conditional sentence..

i don't agree that 'If only it would rain' is a dependent clause, though it may have the form of one. One can postulate an independent clause ('things would be much better'), but that is conjuring up something that isn't there. It seems to me that in terms of meaning, 'If only it would rain' has more in common with 'i wish it would rain' than with an implied conditional.

Utterances befinning with 'if only express an exclamatory wish (Quirk et al, 1985.842). This does not make them dependent on, or subordinate to, any other utterance. They are complete utterances, not fragments.

I like your analysis, 5jj, and appreciate the references. It's interesting that H & P have examples of "if only" with an apodosis included. While I think it is possible to come up with cases in which the context would indicate that satisfaction of the wished-for protasis situation is still possible even when the apodosis is not uttered:

A: Maybe Bill will get here in time to see the fireworks.
B: If only he would hurry up!

I agree that, in cases where there is not such a context and the "if only"-sentence come as an isolated utterance, non-satisfaction of the condition seems to be presupposed; and the utterance itself feels complete. Perhaps "if only" in such cases could be analyzed as a discourse marker. As I write this, it occurs to me that sometimes "if only" appears all by itself as an exclamation:

A: I wish Bill could get time off from work so that he could join us.
B: If only!

Note that this is not possible with normal conditionals:

A: Bill will need to get time off from work to be able to join us.
B: *If!

I just checked Renaat Declerck's Conditionals: A Comprehensive Empirical Analysis (2001), and he has a section on "if only"-conditionals, which begins with the following sentence: "The Q-clause [i.e., the apodosis] can also be covert after P-clauses [i.e., protases] introduced by if only and expressing a tentative (= not very hopeful) or counterfactual wish" (p. 384). All his homemade examples are punctuated, interestingly, as exclamations.

I'm not sure exactly what he means by "covert" (does that mean "absent" or "present in some sense"?), but one of the subsections following his treatment of "if only"-conditionals is also, I think, worthy of note. He calls them "Q-less if-clauses used for weak manipulation." These express, as he says, "a very polite directive (request, offer, invitation) or suggestion" (p. 386). Here are a few of his examples:

If the gentlemen would move to the smoking-room now? (invitation)
Suppose we left in half an hour. (suggestion)
[I've got to leave this morning;] so if you'll make out my bill, please?

 

[5jj]

I'm not sure exactly what he means by "covert" (does that mean "absent" or "present in some sense"?

I take it to mean 'hidden', implying that it is there in some sense. i don't like that. If it is Q-less, then Q is not there! you may recall from a discussion we had on another topic that I believe in dealing with what we have in front of us. Once we we start talking of things we assume to be there, even if nobody can see/hear them, I think we are on shaky ground.

On p 385, Declerck notes 'the similarity between wishes introduced by if only and real conditionals', implying, it seems to m,e that if only wish clauses are conditionals of some sort - but not real conditionals.

I'll have to read through that whole section again, rather more slowl this time, before I can really be sure about what he is saying.

 

[jutfrank]

"The Q-clause [i.e., the apodosis] can also be covert after P-clauses [i.e., protases] introduced by if only

I'm not sure exactly what he means by "covert" (does that mean "absent" or "present in some sense"?)

I take it to mean 'hidden', implying that it is there in some sense. i don't like that. If it is Q-less, then Q is not there!

Yes, this is what I was getting at in post #10. I do agree that the apodosis is in some way 'there'. I say it exists as unuttered logic. But I don't like to say that the 'clause' is not there, but rather that it's the expression of the logic that isn't there. A clause is just a grammatical structure through which the logical form of thought can be expressed. That may sound like a minor quibble, but I think it's an important point.

I believe in dealing with what we have in front of us. Once we we start talking of things we assume to be there, even if nobody can see/hear them, I think we are on shaky ground.

We'll disagree here. I think there are lots of cases in language where a certain element, whether logical, phonological, morphological, syntactic or lexical, is implied or elided or covert in some way.

, but one of the subsections following his treatment of "if only"-conditionals is also, I think, worthy of note. He calls them "Q-less if-clauses used for weak manipulation." These express, as he says, "a very polite directive (request, offer, invitation) or suggestion" (p. 386). Here are a few of his examples:

If the gentlemen would move to the smoking-room now? (invitation)
Suppose we left in half an hour. (suggestion)
[I've got to leave this morning;] so if you'll make out my bill, please?

I'm not sure it's right to consider these completely 'Q-less'. Although they do have, like exclamatory if only utterances, a robust illocutionary force, there can still be considered to be an implied logical consequence to each one. Something like:

If the gentlemen would move to the smoking-room now [it would please me]
Suppose we left in half an hour [would that be acceptable to you?]
[I've got to leave this morning;] so if you'll make out my bill, please? [that would be much appreciated]

An utterance need not be logically explicit in order to have illocutionary force, nor need it be grammatically complete. Logically speaking, there can be no ifs without thens.