Azhong's Writing Practice.

[azhong]

(My practice.
@linguoboy: Not did I read your latest comments that you added later after you had replied shortly, till hours after I had uploaded this post when I was examining it again. Thank you. I will write that passage again days later when I finish my coming trip to meet some acquaintances in my school years.)

Two groups of young men were confronting each other, a few meters apart in the secluded, moonlit corner of the park. The two heads stood in front, negotiating; then, their voices rising higher and higher, the bargain of no agreement turned into a quarrel. Soon, some others standing behind joined, too; they yelled and provoked each other and waved their weapons. A stone, suddenly, was thrown out, which spawned all people rushing forward at once, hustling and beating. The rods and clubs clanked, the folks cursed and snarled, all fighting in a mess.

[azhong]

(see the quotation in the next post.)

[linguoboy]

S1)Being hungry, he walked away.
(Because he was hungry, he walked away (to dine).)
S2)Hungry, he walked away.
(In the state of being hungry, he walked away (for next meeting, maybe).)

S3)Listening to the music, he was playing the computer game.
(In the state of listening to the music, he was playing the computer game.)
S4)Having listened to the music over, he gave comments on it to us.
(In the state of …)

S5)Having being listening to the music when I visited him, he was less interested to chat with me.
(In the state of …)

This is not grammatical. You can't stack two or three gerundive-participles like this.

S6)*Being listening to the music, he didn’t hear the baby cry.
(Because he was listening to the music, he didn’t hear the baby cry.)
Q1: S6 is ungrammatical, where “being” should be left out, I guess? Is it possible then to make grammatical sentences started with “Being listening to” instead of “listening to” or “having being listening to”?

No. This simply isn't a construction used in English.

S7)Hearing my calling, he glanced up.
(In the state of hearing my calling, he glanced up.)

You might need to refer back to my previous comments on the use of pronouns in these types of expressions. This is technically grammatical but (a) stilted and (b) ambiguous. "Calling" is also a noun meaning "career one feels called to do". That's by far the most plausible interpretation of "my calling", so "hearing my calling" has the possible meaning "hearing what my calling is". If the meaning is "He heard me call and glanced up", the usual way to phrase this is "Hearing me calling..."

S8)Because hearing my calling, he glanced up.
Q2: What’s the subtle differences between S7 and S8?

S8 is unidiomatic and perhaps ungrammatical. ("Because" is in a state of transition, but its prepositional uses are still slangy and not acceptable to many speakers.) As a conjunction, because introduces a subordinate clause, i.e. "because he heard me calling". It can be used together with the preposition of to introduce a noun phrase, but this sounds stilted by comparison. That is, you could say "because of hearing me calling" but it sounds odd when the alternative is "because he heard me calling", which is grammatically simpler and more common.

[azhong]

(See linguoboy's quotation below.)

[azhong]

(See linguoboy's quotation below.)

[linguoboy]

S5’)Having been listening to the music when I visited him, he was less interested to chat with me.

It's possible, but I'm trying to think of cases where you might want to actually use a construction like this. I googled and found this example:

E1 Having been listening to MF DOOM recently, I thought I'd ask: Did we ever find out who Mr. Fantastik is?

What's the advantage of "having been listening" over "having listened"? It emphasises that the action is still ongoing. Is this relevant to the clause that follows? As far as I can see, not really. Here's a better example"

E2 This line would then mean that the respondent would be counted as having been listening to BBC WM at these times.

This is from an article on how radio listenership is measured and I can see the necessity of the construction here for emphasising simultaneously that an action was going and that it is viewed as a bounded event in the past (although with consequences reaching into the present).

Bottom line is this is a rare construction in English and there aren't many instances where it's truly the best way to phrase something.

S7)[i]Hearing my calling...

I am going to change “my calling” for “my voice” and then ask the same question again.
S7’)Hearing my voice, he glanced up.
S8-1)Because of hearing my voice, he glanced up.
S8-2) When hearing my voice, he glanced up.
What are the subtle differences between S7 and S8-1 and S8-2 respectively? S7 can seemingly imply either of them to me.

I think they all contain the same implication: He glanced up because he heard my voice and this action was almost immediate. (S8-2) sounds the least felicitous since the "when" here is superfluous; the same notions of causality and simultaneity are conveyed just with (S7). "When" is most often used in these constructions when it means "whenever", e.g.:

When hearing my voice, he comes to the door = Whenever he hears my voice, he comes to the door.

(S8-1) just makes the causality explicit. But, as I said, it's implicit in the other two statements.

Hearing the customers’ chuckles escalating into chortles, Nick glanced up out the corner of his eyes in and in time to see, over the coffee mill, he saw in time...

To make sure, is S2 less proper than S1? If yes, why then? (BTW, S2 is grammatical, right?)
S1)Hearing the voice, Nick glanced up in time to see it.
S2)*Hearing the voice, Nick glanced up and saw it in time.

Both are grammatical--and awkward, since the phrasing makes it seem like "it" refers to "voice" and you can't see a voice. "This" would make it clear that the reference is to whatever was described int the previous sentence.

The issue with (S2) is "in time...for what?" The implication of "in time" is that an action has to be performed before a certain time in order to fulfill a condition. In (S1), it's clear what this is: in time to see. But in (S2), it's not. Did he see it in time to stop it? To say something? To get out of the way? The thought feels incomplete.

[azhong]

(A practice by rewriting my earlier passage.)
Hearing the customers’ chuckles escalating into chortles, Nick glanced up out the corner of his eyes. Over the coffee mill, he saw the less muscular of the two was swinging his fist toward his buddy. Although stronger, the hit one neither ducked nor defended; he accepted his punishment with glee by just sitting straight. Not a solid punch it was, naturally: The fist palpably sped down as it approached. And not even when Nick, smiling, drew his attention back to his chores finally was the fist separated from the cheek it had been sticking to after its playful blow. The soapy forks and mugs clinked, much more softly than the way rods and bats collided in a gang fight.

[linguoboy]

Much better! But there are still a few awkward bits. (I've found that describing physical action clearly and concisely is prose is very challenging.)

(A practice by rewriting my earlier passage.)
Hearing the customers’ chuckles escalating into chortles, Nick glanced up out the corner of his eyes. Over the coffee mill, he saw the less muscular of the two was swinging his fist toward his buddy. Although stronger, the hit one neither ducked nor defended; he accepted his punishment with glee by just sitting straight. Not a solid punch it was, naturally: The fist palpably sped down as it approached. And not even when Nick, smiling, drew his attention back to his chores finally was the fist separated from the cheek it had been sticking to after its playful blow. The soapy forks and mugs clinked, much more softly than the way rods and bats collided in a gang fight.

1. "hit one" is just a very awkward designation. Here you could just say "the buddy" and it would be clear which of the two men you mean.
2. Better without "it was".
3. I was so intent on other issues last time I missed that "sped down" isn't an idiomatic expression. The opposite of "sped up" is "slowed down". (I think this contributed to the ambiguity last time.)
4. The placement of "finally" here is confusing. If it refers to Nick, it should come after "smiling"; if it refers to the fist, it should come between "fist" and "separated".
5. "stick to" is normally used when a surface is tacky. Gum "sticks to" your shoe or the carpet; duct tape "sticks to" surfaces ordinary tape doesn't, etc. It's weird to use it here when presumably the one man is just holding his fist against the head of the other.

[azhong]

Another inquiry of the position of adverbs. Thank you in advance for your comments.
S1)I now am a student.
S2-1)I am now a student.
S2-2)I am a student now.
S2-3) Now, I am a student.
S1 emphasizes more on “now” than the three in S2.
S2-1 is more literal, or less oral, than S2-2 and S2-3.
S2-3 emphasizes more on “now” than S2-2.

So is S3, emphasizing more on “now” than S4 and S5.
S3)I now have a book.
S4)I have a book now.
S5)Now, I have a book.

S6)*I have now a book.
S7)*I am eating happily my lunch.
S6 and S7 are unnatural. “Have” and “eat” are transitive verbs, and not any adverb will idiomatically stand between a transitive verb and its object.

A very natural position for an adverb of manner is between the auxiliary verb and the main verb. e.g.:
S8-1) I will certainly show up at your party.
S8-2) I do always go to work happily everyday.
S8-3) My salary is not high, but I everyday do always happily go to work. (emphasizing on “everyday”.)

As for the adverb of time:
S9)I tomorrow will show up. (“Tomorrow” is emphasized.)
S10)I will tomorrow show up. (Maybe natural and without any emphasis?)

[azhong]

S1)Not even when Nick, smiling, finally drew his attention back to his chores was the fist separated from the cheek it had been holding against after its playful blow.

How about the next one? Does "with simles" also work fine as "smiling" after moving here? And, I suppose the position of "finally" also to be grammatical, but just losing the emphasis. Am I correct?
S2)Not even when Nick, with smiles, drew his attention back finally to his chores was the fist separated from the cheek it had been holding against after its playful blow.

Thank you.

[azhong]

("Not a word...", see linguoboy's quotation below.)

[linguoboy]

First, a metaquestion: do you just want feedback on whether you’ve used all these unusual syntactic constructions correctly and not on how jarring it sounds to stuff so many into a single passage?

[azhong]

I suppose you are merely referring to my lastest practice passage in particular, right?
If so, well, up to you. And thank you.
Basically I was just memorizing some sentences I've reviewed today, although I did try to have some fun by developing them into an organic passage. The plot, however, is somewhat nonsense, I know.

(Are the lastest passage really so jarring? May I ask where the jar is? Almost all the words said by "he" are entirely borrowed from Ms. Rowling, the words of Vordemolt in chapter 1, HP7.)

Again, Voldemort looked up at the slowly revolving body as he went on, “I shall attend to the boy in person. There have been too many mistakes where Harry Potter is concerned. Some of them have been my own. That Potter lives is due more to my errors than to his triumphs.”
The company around the table watched Voldemort apprehensively, each of them, by his or her expression, afraid that they might be blamed for Harry Potter’s continued existence. Voldemort, however, seemed to be speaking more to himself than to any of them, still addressing the unconscious body above him.
“I have been careless, and so have been thwarted by luck and chance, those wreckers of all but the best-laid plans. But I know better now. I understand those things that I did not understand before. I must be the one to kill Harry Potter, and I shall be.”

[azhong]

Or do you refer to the one immediately previous to it? Indeed too complex that sentence is, and here I construct it again.

Hearing the customers’ chuckles escalating into chortles, Nick glanced up out the corner of his eyes. Over the coffee mill, he saw the less muscular of the two was swinging his fist toward his buddy. Although stronger, the buddy neither ducked nor defended; he accepted his punishment with glee by just sitting straight. Not a solid punch, naturally; the fist palpably slowed down as it approached. Then, not being withdrawn at once, it was hold against its target, the buddy’s cheek, for quite a while. Smiling at the playful intimacy, Nick drew back to his chores. The soapy forks and mugs clinked again, much more softly than the way rods and bats collided in a gang fight.

[linguoboy]

(My practice, mainly to write the sentences I've read from my memory.)
Not a word since I entered had he said but just lookinged up, a hanging fan revolving there[*]. ByJudging from his expression, he was thoughtful.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked.
“I shall attend to that boy in person,” he said. “ There have been too many mistakes where Potter is concerned. Some of them have been my own. The fact of his continued existence is due more to my errors than to his triumphs.”
“Who is Potter?”
“I have been careless, and so thwarted by luck and chance, those wreckers of all but the best-laid plans,” he seemed to speak to himself more than reply to me, his eyes kept staring at the fan above him. “But now I have understood what I didn’t understand before. I must be the one to kill Potter. And I shall be.”
“Stop saying such nonsensical things; not a word can I figure out. You are probably too tired. Now take some good rest, and I will soon come to visit you again.”

This first sentence is a real doozy. You've got inversion, tmesis, and a dangling participle, all in the course of a score of words.

I know you're practicing inversion but using it here and then repeating it six lines later is jarring. It's an unusual, almost poetic construction, rarely deployed in contemporary prose because of the artificial effect it creates. The same could be said for the tmesis (perhaps not the most accurate term for this rhetorical device but I can't think of a better one). To show you what I mean, let's redo that first sentence without the inversion:

(A1) He had said since I entered not a word but just looked up.

"Since I entered" is a subordinate clause. Normally, unless you're dealing with a relative clause, these precede or follow the main clause:

(A2) He had said not a word since I entered but just looked up.
(A3) Since I entered, he had said not a word but just looked up.

What you've done is put it within the clause, splitting subject from predicate. This isn't ungrammatical, but it is unusual and makes the sentence stand out. Inversion, as I said before, also makes a sentence stand out and when you use both together, well, it begins to draw attention to the style in a way that detracts from the content.

Now for the dangling participle: "a hanging fan revolving there" just feels detached from the rest of the sentence. Why is it even being mentioned? Is Voldemort looking at it? I guess he must be because later you say "his eyes kept staring at the fan above him". If that's the case, then simply say as much: "but just looked up at a hanging fan revolving there".

Good style is all about balance and when you overload a particular sentence or paragraph with too many unusual rhetorical devices it doesn't read well. The function of unusual constructions is to make the reader stop and pay more attention to a sentence than they would normally. That's very useful when an author wants to make sure we don't miss something. Using them in an ordinary expository sentence is a waste--unless you're trying to signal to the reader that there's some detail here you really don't want them to miss. In fact, it's worse than a waste--it's a distraction. The reader can't tell from the style of the passage which parts are important and which ones aren't and just stops paying close attention to any of them.

[Linguaphile]

(Are the lastest passage really so jarring? May I ask where the jar is? Almost all the words said by "he" are entirely borrowed from Ms. Rowling, the words of Vordemolt in chapter 1, HP7.)

Again, Voldemort looked up at the slowly revolving body as he went on, “I shall attend to the boy in person. There have been too many mistakes where Harry Potter is concerned. Some of them have been my own. That Potter lives is due more to my errors than to his triumphs.”
The company around the table watched Voldemort apprehensively, each of them, by his or her expression, afraid that they might be blamed for Harry Potter’s continued existence. Voldemort, however, seemed to be speaking more to himself than to any of them, still addressing the unconscious body above him.
“I have been careless, and so have been thwarted by luck and chance, those wreckers of all but the best-laid plans. But I know better now. I understand those things that I did not understand before. I must be the one to kill Harry Potter, and I shall be.”

Now for the dangling participle: "a hanging fan revolving there" just feels detached from the rest of the sentence. Why is it even being mentioned? Is Voldemort looking at it? I guess he must be because later you say "his eyes kept staring at the fan above him". If that's the case, then simply say as much: "but just looked up at a hanging fan revolving there".

I know I've mentioned this before, but Rowling often uses these constructions to emphasize the unnaturalness of a situation and point out certain features that are important to her plot. She wants us to remember that Harry Potter's world is not like ours. It's supposed to be jarring in a way that most people's ordinary everyday speech is not.
Azhong, in the passage that you've used as a model here, the revolving body is a very important focus. Here's a quote from a bit earlier in the chapter, where the revolving body is introduced and its significance (and the significance of telling the reader whether or not someone is looking at it) is explained:

As their eyes grew accustomed to the lack of light, they were drawn upward to the strangest feature of the scene: an apparently unconscious human figure hanging upside down over the table, revolving slowly as if suspended by an invisible rope, and reflected in the mirror and in the bare, polished surface of the table below. None of the people seated underneath this singular sight were looking at it except for a pale young man sitting almost directly below it. He seemed unable to prevent himself from glancing upward every minute or so.

Azhong, I know you must have read that passage above, so I'm just posting it there to bring it to your attention (and for the benefit of linguoboy or anyone else following this discussion, who hasn't read it), but do you understand how the emphasis that is being placed on the body in these passages is not a normal emphasis for something as mundane as a ceiling fan? This is why linguoboy asked you "why is it even being mentioned?" and it was not until you posted Rowling's text above that I realized what was happening here. You are mimicking the language, but entirely changing the context, and that really does make all the difference.

Rowling's books are hugely popular because they transport readers to a unique world, not because they use the best example of modern English. Using language in unusual ways is one of the methods she uses to transport us to that world. Using inversion and other techniques to put the focus on certain aspects of the scene is one of the methods she uses to help us understand which things are important in a world that is otherwise so strange we might not be able to figure that out for ourselves (because in Harry Potter novels there are strange little details that just add charm and make the novel seem clever, and then there are strange BIG details that are vital to the plot, and she needs to get the reader to pay more attention to the important ones). In the passage you are using, the revolving body is a big detail and she doesn't want it to be dismissed as some minor detail like "haha, in Harry's world ceiling fans look like unconscious bodies, how strange!" and then forgotten about by the reader. She wants us to know that this particular aspect is important, so she keeps bringing it up over and over, and she uses specific techniques to emphasize it.
This is nothing like an ordinary ceiling fan and she makes that very clear because we wouldn't normally discuss an ordinary ceiling fan in this way. (Which I think is exactly what linguoboy was getting at when he asked "why is it even mentioned?": we wouldn't normally discuss an ordinary ceiling fan in this way.)
You can't just take the language from a fantasy novel and apply it to real-world scenarios and expect to to flow smoothly and sound natural in other contexts. Sometimes it will, as you've seen with some of your better passages in this thread. Other times it will not... as you've also seen from comments in this thread! I don't think there is going to be a good method to help you figure out when it will and will not work, other than using other texts as models and paying attention to the similarities and differences they have when compared to Rowling's work (or when compared to each other, or to any other source of English).

[linguoboy]

Linguaphile, thank you for posting that. Having that context really helps me understand why I'm seeing such a disconnect between style and content.

Anyway, back to this paragraph:

Hearing the customers’ chuckles escalating into chortles, Nick glanced up out the corner of his eyes. Over the coffee mill, he saw the less muscular of the two was swinging his fist toward his buddy. Although stronger, the buddy neither ducked nor defended; he accepted his punishment with glee by just sitting straight. Not a solid punch, naturally; the fist palpably slowed down as it approached. Then, not being withdrawn at once, it was holdheld against its target, the buddy’s cheek, for quite a while. Smiling at the playful intimacy, Nick drew back to his chores. The soapy forks and mugs clinked again, much more softly than the way rods and bats collided in a gang fight.

It sounds much better now. Good work!

[azhong]

(My practice: A morning scene of a by-lake villa.)
He got up in spirit; the bed was soft and clean. Off the bed in gloom toward the French window, he drew the heavy curtain apart and, in a sudden, an influx of the soft morning light broke the darkness of the room, showing its simple furniture and tidiness. Looking out of the window was a pretty scene: a huge jede-green lake surmounted by hills and mountains afar in front which overlapped one another, all covered by carpets of trees.

Drawing the window screen open, he stepped into the balcony paved in red bricks. There was a round table, its desktop glass and legs white metal tube, accompanied by two white plastic arm chairs at its both sides, the thrones for admiring the beauty. The metal railing was also white, which he leaned on, propping on his elbow, enjoying the cozy morning breeze. The villa was built by the bank and was extended into upon the lake, below the balcony not earth but all water. To his left was a section of bridge passing to the pavilion near the lake center; to his right was a cluster of lotus, March seemingly not its time to blossom yet. Fish surfaced to breathe here and there, producing circles of ripples. At a distance, two white water birds were hovering along the lake surface, foraging.

Then, noticing some other sparse ripples nearby were clearer and enlarged into bigger circles before it finally disappeared, he thought it started drizzling. He stared up at the sky with his mood turning low - almost none liked to have rain during his trip - but the sky was bright and dry. After some observations, he found out these ripples were actually induced by the dews that, having condensed on the roof over night, were falling from the eaves sporadically. He regained his good moods, looking forward to a coming buffet later for breakfast.

[azhong]

(A self-emended version: the first paragraph.)
He got off the bed in spirit; the bed was soft and clean. Walking to the French window in the dim light from behind the heavy curtains, he drew them apart and an influx of the soft morning light brightened his hotel pajama, the simple furniture of the room and its tidiness. Looking out of the window, it was a pretty scene: a huge jade-green lake surmounted by hills and mountains afar in front, which overlapped one another and were all covered by carpets of trees.

[Linguaphile]

(A self-emended version: the first paragraph.)
He got off the bed in spirit; the bed was soft and clean. Walking to the French window in the dim light from behind the heavy curtain, which he drew apart and an influx of the soft morning light brightened his hotel pajama, the simple furniture of the room and its tidiness. Looking out of the window, there was a pretty scene: a huge jade-green lake surmounted by hills and mountains afar in front which overlapped one another, and were all covered by carpets of trees.

It is better! Things that aren't clear:

He got off the bed in spirit: What do you mean by this? I can think of two possible meanings: (1) He got off the bed in good spirits (=in a good mood), or (2) In his mind he got off the bed (= he thought about and imagined himself doing it, but he didn't actually do it). Either way, you'll need to re-word it to make it more clear.

Walking to the French window in the dim light from behind the heavy curtain, which he drew apart and an influx of the soft morning light brightened his hotel pajama, the simple furniture of the room and its tidiness.
Here, your sentence has two parts:
(1) Walking to the French window in the dim light from behind the heavy curtain, which he drew apart
(2) and an influx of the soft morning light brightened his hotel pajama, the simple furniture of the room and its tidiness.
The problem is that the subject of (1) is "he", but the subject of (2) is "an influx of soft morning light", and your grammar here doesn't allow for the change in subject.
I suggest:
He walked to the French window in the dim light [which came] from behind the heavy curtain, which he drew apart, and an influx of the soft morning light brightened his hotel pajamas, the simple furniture of the room and its tidiness.
Even so, I think it would sound better as two separate sentences.

pajama is usually plural, like "pants" or "trousers" (at least in my dialect of English).

there was a pretty scene: a huge jade-green lake surmounted by hills and mountains afar in front which overlapped one another
"Surmount" isn't the right verb here. Is this a lake surrounded by hills and mountains, which are far in front of it? Or it is far in front of them? I would say: "...a huge jade-green lake surrounded by hills and mountains which overlapped one another."