Posted yesterday at 6:00 p.m.
As a child, we are told this rule: the saws (si) do not like the rays (rais). It allows us to remember that with the conjunction ifwe must not conjugate a verb in -rais/rait, but rather in -vais/vait.
What if… it wasn’t always true?
This rule applies well if we use the conjunction if to introduce a hypothesis. We must then use the imperfect and we therefore do not write “if I would have known”, but if I had known. And we don’t write “if you want”, but If you wanted.
Corn if is also used correctly with the conditional – and the future – when one wants to express a concession. This job is quite rare and it is probably not taught in school. Whenever a reporter uses this construct, The Press receives dozens of messages emphasizing this fault which is not one.
Here are two (real, but shortened) examples. It had to happen, even if we could have done without it. If all bridges will be open to traffic for the start of the school year, the respite will be short-lived.
The Linguistic Troubleshooting Bank of the Office québécois de la langue française explains that “we can analyze this type of construction belonging to a very strong register of language as an ellipse of s'(it is true that), s'(il must be admitted that), if (it is believed that)”.
If we add the words in parentheses to a sentence that we believe to be faulty, we see that it is not. While it is true that all bridges will be open to traffic for the start of the school year, the respite will be short-lived. It had to happen, even if we have to admit that we could have done without it.
You can also use if correctly with the conditional and with the future after verbs wonder, ignore and to know in an indirect query. We wondered if he would agree to explain himself. I don’t know if you like this author. We will never know if she could have been saved.
No fees or none?
Is it normal to see “no charge” very often with a s because any means without ?
Response
Although it seems curious, the indefinite adjective any works well in the plural in some cases, especially when a noun has no singular, such as costsor when it is to be used in the plural as worksin one of the examples below.
So we write correctly no fees. No fees will be refunded. Due to the pandemic, we could not celebrate any funeral at the church. He’s overworked because he hasn’t taken any vacations since he was hired.. We learned that there would be no road works in this area. Urgent repairs will not incur any additional charges. The culprits will not suffer any reprisals, assured the State.