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Split Infinitiveshttp://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~susan/cyc/s/split.htmThe infinitive is the unconjugated, or root, form of the verb. For example, to be in English, être in French, esse in Latin; or to love in English, aimer in French, amare in Latin. Notice how the infinitive in English is two words, but only one word in French or Latin. When Latin was a high-status language, grammarians used to try to force the rules of Latin onto English, a language with a rather different grammar. One such rule they invented was "do not split an infinitive" -- that is, do not put anything between the to and the rest of the verb. Their reasoning seems to be that, since it is impossible to split the single-word infinitive in Latin, one shouldn't split it in English, either. So, something like to boldly go is beyond the pale, according to these Latin grammarians. The split infinitive construction goes back to the 13th century, but was relatively rare until the 19th. No split infinitives are to be found in the works of Shakespeare, Spenser, Pope, or Dryden, or in the King James Version of the Bible. -- alt.usage.english FAQ I can think of two very good reasons for not splitting an infinitive. Because you feel that the rules of English ought to conform to the grammatical precepts of a language that died a thousand years ago. Because you wish to cling to a pointless affectation of usage that is without the support of any recognized authority of the last 200 years, even at the cost of composing sentences that are ambiguous, inelegant, and patently contorted. It is exceedingly difficult to find any authority who condemns the split infinitive - Theodore Bernstein, H. W. Fowler, Ernest Gowers, Eric Partridge, Rudolph Flesch, Wilson Follett, Roy H. Copperud, and others too tedious to enumerate here all agree that there is no logical reason not to split an infinitive. -- Bill Bryson, Mother Tongue, 1990 http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~susan/bib/nf/b/bllbrysn.htm |