Can someone explain the structure of the following sentence?
- It was not until hours later did I find him.
Does it have anything to do with emphasis ?
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1 Answer
The sentence is not grammatical. It should either be
It was not until hours later that I found him.
or
Not until hours later did I find him.
This structure indeed emphasizes the temporal adverb. It means the same thing as
I didn't find him until hours later. (= I found him hours later)
answered Mar 3, 2015 at 19:14
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1Yes, it seems to be a conflation of that first sentence and a more complex construction with the same meaning, Not until hours later did I find him. Either one is correct, but they don't have the same structure, so they can't be combined at will. Commented Mar 3, 2015 at 19:16
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2I would disagree on those two sentences having the same meaning. "until hours later" implies a relatively long period, whereas "only hours later" invokes a relatively short period. Commented Mar 3, 2015 at 19:17
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Thanks for the comments. I edited my answer accordingly. Commented Mar 3, 2015 at 19:52