Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[hela]

Dear teachers,

Would you please tell me how you understand the word "afford" hereunder, and why?

Why novels and plays are so often untrue to life is because their authors, perhaps of necessity, make their characters all of a piece. They cannot afford to make them self-contradictory [ 1) writers could not allow themselves to make the characters contradictory 2) writers could not allow the characters to be self-contradictory], for then they become incomprehensible, and yet self-contradictory is what most of us are.
Somerset Maugham, A friend in need

Thank you for your help.
Hela

[CP]

Usually, "afford" means to be able to purchase something, to have enough money to buy something. But it also can be used as here, to mean that one cannot, for practical purposes, do something, because it is too hard, too costly in some sense other than in money.

A writer has to make his characters unrealistically consistent, not self-contradictory. He cannot, for all practical purposes, make his characters like real people, because of the risk that the reader will become confused or irritated. That risk is too costly; that is why the writer can't afford to do it.

Make sense?
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You live a new life for every new language you speak. -Czech proverb

[hela]

Yes, it does!
But for translation purposes, would you say that the writer cannot allow HIMSELF to do that, or he cannot allow HIS CHARACTERS to be that?

All the best

[hela]

One more question, please.

In the following sentence the writer says: "In books on logic they will tell you that it is absurd to say that yellow is tubular or gratitude heavier than air".

Would you please tell me why he uses the future there? Can it be replaced by the present?

All the best,
Hela

[CP]

The way the quoted material is written, it means that the writer cannot afford to make his characters that way.

As for using the future tense in what the books say, yes, you can put it in the present tense. The writer used the future tense to indicate that when you go check those books, in one minute or weeks from now, sometime in the future, that is what the books will tell you. It's okay either way.
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You live a new life for every new language you speak. -Czech proverb

[hela]

Thank you very much CP.

Have a nice day