English Question: Difference between these sentences.

* “those days are gone”—> here, “go” is being used as a past participle adjective.

The phrasal verb “go out” is not commonly used in this way, so “He is gone out” strikes me as strange. It’s not grammatically incorrect, just odd.

“Here the object is “The pain”..”

Actually, pain is not the object, but the subject of the sentence.

He is not here, he is gone out.

There is word play involved. That sentence as it stands sounds odd indeed. Here is I would fix it to give it the same meaning. He is not here, he is gone. Out. It has an aesthetic of Southern English. Also, a style Hemmingway might have written in.

The pain has gone, makes a reader, nowadays want to ask, where? Where has it gone? Away? The pain is gone, is definite.

Those days are gone. As in, the days will never come back. Those days have gone. As in the days have long lived and are now a memory, but still exists (within the memory).

Obviously I’m not an English major. But I have a grasp on how things could be looked upon and interpreted aesthetically. Hope I helped a bit :D Great question.

He has gone out, because his leaving is in the past and you’re mentioning the actual act of leaving, so you need to use past tense. He is gone, however, would be correct because it’s not mentioning him leaving, just that he is not currently there.

The pain is the subject @AstroChuck is correct. Both sentences mean the same for #1, but in America at least the second version, the pain is gone is more commonly used. Same is #2, using a form of the verb to be is said more often in America so you would hear those days are gone in America more often.

As for He is not here, he is gone out. that sentence is wrong. You are using a present form of the verb to be in the latter part of that sentence, but talking about the past, and using a form of the verb to be is odd anyway in the sentence. He is not here, he has gone out is better. Many other ways to say the last part of that sentence…he went out..he has left already… or simply…he left.

So my response got modded because I forgot to capitalize a word?

Anyways, like I had said and others are saying they are essentially the same

He is gone out

Out is a participle, and it is dangling. That isn’t good. It should be He is gone, which would be correct.

@JLeslie @AstroChuck : The correct method to identify the object is asking a question to verb, so I thought It was an object. I mean, here for the sentence The pain is/has gone. Ask What has/is gone? answer is Pain. So, is it an object?

“go” is an unaccusative verb. Unaccusative verbs are intransitive verbs whose subject is not the thematic agent. But that’s not important, what’s important is that they can be conjugated with either “be” or “have”. Other unaccusative verbs are “come” and “fall”.

The pain is gone.
The pain has gone.
The subject in both these sentences is “the pain”.

@filmfann No, there is no dangling participle in “He is gone out.” “Go out” is a phrasal verb.

@englishgeek A better method to identify the object is to find the noun that follows the verb in a declarative active sentence. There is no such noun here. I think you’re confusing subject and object, which are syntactic roles, with patient and agent, which are semantic roles.

@englishgeek The object usually is towards the end. Simple sentences typically go Subject Verb Object, but that can vary greatly of course, adverbs, prepositions, all sorts of things can be in there. The object answers what the subject did regarding the verb. Not sure I am explaining it well. Here are some examples of Subject Verb Object:

Joe swung the bat. Joe is the subject, swung is the verb, and the bat is the object.
I mailed him a letter. I am the subject, mailed is the verb, letter is the object.

Hope that helps.

What is your first language?

@JLeslie No. Object is not always at the end. e.g.
A letter was written by Harry.
The door was opened.(by someone)
A wrong deciosion has been taken. (by someone)

Here, object comes first.

Usually. I said usually, not always.

I am pretty sure A letter was written by Harry…letter is the subject, was written the verb, and Harry is the object of the preposition. But, we need someone who knows better to correct me if I am wrong. I sent your question to Jeruba who is one of our English experts.

@englishgeek No, you’re confusing syntax and semantics. It’s true that these nouns are semantic agents – they don’t initiate the action. The semantic agents are Harry, someone, and someone. But the subjects are “A letter”, “The door” and “A wrong decision”.

@englishgeek Maybe you are thinking the subject is always a person? Like how the word subject is used in British English sort of? The people are Royal subjects?

Please correct me if I’m wrong here because I’m not quite sure.

“The pain is gone” and “The pain has gone” are both grammatically correct and convey essentially the same idea. However, “He has gone out” is not interchangeable with “He is gone out,” the latter of which is incorrect grammar. I think the reason for the discrepancy is that, in the sentence “The pain is gone,” “gone” is not actually used as a verb. “Gone” in that sentence is an adverb(?); you can substitute “here” into that sentence and it still makes sense (“the pain is here”), which illustrates the difference between the two sentences (you can’t say “the pain has here”). “Gone out,” however, is always a verb phrase; it can’t double as an adverb, so you can’t use the same sentence structure as you can in the other example.

@JLeslie I think @englishgeek is right; Harry is the subject. It’s an example of using the passive voice in which the subject comes last. I thought, anyway.

Welcome to Fluther.

Let’s back up a little.

You need to make a distinction and understand the difference between “past tense” and “present participle”.

Past tense: He went.
Present participle: He has gone. (Except that English is kind of strange in some of its verb forms, this could be read the same as “He has went” – if that were a correct verb form which it is not!)

The difference has to do with when action is completed. “He went” indicates an action that happened and was completed in the past. “He has gone” indicates an action that started in the past and may have only recently been completed. In this sense, “He went” and “He has gone” may have very nearly the same meanings. In more complex formations it may indicate an action that has been completed and may occur again:

“He ran the race” means that he did run the race.
“He has run the race” means that he ran the race in the past, and also indicates that he may run it again (the next time that race is held, for example), or he has recently completed the race.

I’m not going to touch “past participle” here, but once you understand “past tense” and “present participle”, then it will be time to move on to “past participle”.

@Mariah Could be. Hmmm…been so long since I have thought about these things. But, by is definitely a preposition, or can be anyway.

Oh, and @filmfann is incorrect. “Out” is a preposition, not a participle. There does seem to be a rule that one shouldn’t end a sentence with a preposition, but I subscribe to Winston Churchill’s excellent retort on the topic: “This is the kind of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put!”)

A “dangling participle” is a whole ‘nother animal.

@Mariah
A letter was written by Harry.
No, “Harry” is not the subject. The subject is “A letter”.

Harry wrote a letter.
Now “Harry” is the subject, and “a letter” is the object.

But in both sentences, “Harry” is the semantic agent.

@morphail Aha, you are correct. I was thinking that using the passive voice puts the subject at the end, but I googled it and it turns out that that using the passive voice switches which noun is the subject. My apologies, @JLeslie, you were right.

@morphail :Do you mean noun acts as subject here?. How could we identify nouns?.

Quiet! My head hurts- it’s been entirely too long since any English class! I guess the phrase use it or lose it is true. :0)

@morphail Those days are gone, days is also a noun here?

@englishgeek Yes, “days” is a noun. All verbs in English have subjects, and the subject is a noun (or pronoun).
see

@JLeslie :Thanks!
@Mariah Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
@the100thmonkey :Thank you very much indeed!
@XOIIO :Yes. you were right and you are. :)
@CWOTUS :Thanks for detailed explanation.
@dreamwolf :Thanks a lot! :D
@morphail :You are simply great..
@Aethelflaed Thank you.

@JLeslie :Update me when @Jeruba throws the answer of this question. :)

@CWOTUS- It’s a common misconception, one that’s often been perpetuated by English teachers, that one should never end a sentence with a preposition. The truth is there is no such rule in English grammar. It is, however, a big no-no in Latin.