Only after he realized

[Boris Tatarenko]

In my grammar book there's a sentence "He only later realized what a difference it would make to our lives".

I'm supposed to use inversion but I cannot change the meaning of the sentence. :roll:

I'm quite confusing with it.

Let me guess first

1) Only after did he realize what a difference it would make to our lives.
2) Only after he realized what a difference would it make to our lives.

 

[emsr2d2]

Your title and your two suggested revisions use "after" but the original uses "later". Is there a reason you didn't stick with "later"?

 

[Boris Tatarenko]

Yes, there's. I have a list of words after which it's neccesary to use inversion. I didn't find "only later" there but there was "only after". Assumiing they're the same I replace "later" with "after".

 

[emsr2d2]

"Only later" is absolutely fine and in your sentences it's what you need. "Only after" has to be followed by the thing it's after.

Only after I had eaten the chicken did I realise it had gone off.
I ate some chicken. Only later did I realise it had gone off.

Note that you can't use the contraction "there's" as you did in your first sentence in post #3.

 

[Boris Tatarenko]

You've just dropped a hint that the correct version is "Only later did he realize what a difference it would make to our lives". Right?

[Note from mod: this was edited after post #6 was written]

 

[emsr2d2]

Almost. You've reversed "did he realise" correctly but you've made an incorrect reversal later on in the sentence.

 

[Boris Tatarenko]

Almost. You've reversed "did he realise" correctly but you've made an incorrect reversal later on in the sentence.

No sooner had I corrected it than you posted your reply.

 

[emsr2d2]

We cross-posted. I've added an edit note to post #5 to explain. Your sentence is now correct. Nice use of inversion in post #8.