Reader Don in Los Angeles County wrote recently with a question about a well-known grammar issue called a “split infinitive.” “I learned about them 50 years ago and I am somewhat sensitive about them ...

When you look up a verb in the dictionary what you find is the verb in the infinitive form. In English it’s two words - ‘to swim’ - but in German it’s just the one schwimmen. In German, there’s a ...

TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. About the Archive This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online ...