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I am wondering whether the following sentence is correct English or not:

The librarian told him that he had a chance of catching several directors all at once, if he would go to the Barnstable Yacht Club.

Shifting the sentence forward into the present results in:

The librarian tells him that he has a chance of catching several directors all at once, if he will go to the Barnstable Yacht Club.

I'd say that "will" is incorrect here, because going to the Barnstable Yacht Club precedes (is a precondition to) the chance of catching the directors there. What am I missing here?

n1ghtm4n4g3r
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1 Answers1

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"Would" has different meanings. It can express a conditional or subjective modality, or it can be used to express the future in past sentences, or other possibilities.

Perhaps more than one of those meanings fits the past tense sentence. So "would" is a good choice.

Moving to the present tense sentence, we no longer require "would" to express the future in a past tense sentence. "If" could be sufficient to establish that it's a conditional. So just omit "would/will" and say "if he goes...".

Sam
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    "If he went..." would be fine in the past tense sentence. – Kate Bunting Jan 29 '22 at 17:01
  • (1) Do I understand correctly that, in the original past-tense sentence, the "shade of meaning" of "would" is unclear? (2) Focusing now on future in the past: do I understand it correctly that past and present tense are not symmetrical in the use of "will"? In present tense, I shouldn't use "will" after "if", but it is OK to use it [in its past-tense form] in past tense after "if"? – n1ghtm4n4g3r Jan 29 '22 at 17:10
  • (1) in my opinion, it has multiple "shades of meaning", across the various possibilities that "would" contains. As Kate wrote, "will/would" wasn't strictly required in the past tense, "If he went..." would have also been acceptable. (2) they would not be expected to be symmetrical, if "would" was not functioning only as the past tense of the word "will". – Sam Jan 29 '22 at 17:20
  • With they would not be expected to be symmetrical, if "would" was not functioning only as the past tense of the word "will"., you seem to say, in a somewhat oblique way, that they are symmetrical, whereas your answer seems to suggest that they are not: Moving to the present tense sentence, [...] So just omit "would/will" and say "if he goes...". I probably misunderstand either (or both?) of these statements. – n1ghtm4n4g3r Jan 29 '22 at 17:31
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    Maybe there are too many "if"s and "not"s in my last comment. They are not ""symmetrical"". Because "would" doesn't mean "will" only. – Sam Jan 29 '22 at 17:40