Without getting bogged down in grammaticalisation, generative theory, deep structure or anything of the kind, it might be interesting to collect inexplicable phenomena: those niggly little things we prefer to brush under the carpet.
Just to get the ball rolling: "We had better go" is totally beyond me. The question form makes it seem some kind of bizarre semi-modal but the negative makes it seem just bizarre. I'm not saying it's difficult to teach as vocabulary
And " I've never been to Russia" takes some figuring out.
Ones of a kind.
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I don't understand why "I've never been to Russia." is difficult. It even fits the explanation that is easiest to explain using the old-style (who knows what the new style is) grammar, where something started in the past and continues through the present. It started when I was born. Never, during my life, did I go to Russia. I'm curious as to your thoughts on it.
"we had better" has modal characteristics, no problem with that. So does the very colloquial (Oz English) equivalent "we better", with its negative "we bettern't"
But what do you mean by saying the negative is bizarre? What is unusual about "we had better not go", given that we are taking "had better" as a single unit equivalent in force to the true modal "must"?
Harzer
But what do you mean by saying the negative is bizarre? What is unusual about "we had better not go", given that we are taking "had better" as a single unit equivalent in force to the true modal "must"?
Harzer
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JuanTwoThree
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As usual I seem to have been somewhere between gnomic and incomprehensible. What I meant was that it seemed easy to take "had better" as a modal idiom, or idiomatic modal, that exists as a whole. That seems to be born out by the negative, as you say, and by the question. I meant to say the negative of the question: "Hadn't we better go?" .
Hang on, I'm talking nonsense....... "Hadn't we better go?" means "We really should go" but "Had we better not go?" is "We really should stay" . And "would rather" works the same: "Wouldn't you rather go?" vs "Would you rather not go?". In fact (imagine light bulb in small slow tired brain) "should" and "ought" do the same. So a surprising consistency and a complete lack of mystery after all. Apart from "had" combining with "go" in the first place , of course.
It's the uniqueness of "be" with "to" in the form "have/has/had been to" that's strange about it. You'd think that someone would have pushed the envelope by now and said "I have been to Paris loads of times. In fact I was to Paris last weekend" without shocking everybody.
Hang on, I'm talking nonsense....... "Hadn't we better go?" means "We really should go" but "Had we better not go?" is "We really should stay" . And "would rather" works the same: "Wouldn't you rather go?" vs "Would you rather not go?". In fact (imagine light bulb in small slow tired brain) "should" and "ought" do the same. So a surprising consistency and a complete lack of mystery after all. Apart from "had" combining with "go" in the first place , of course.
It's the uniqueness of "be" with "to" in the form "have/has/had been to" that's strange about it. You'd think that someone would have pushed the envelope by now and said "I have been to Paris loads of times. In fact I was to Paris last weekend" without shocking everybody.