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Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by thaumasiotes on Thursday June 20, 2024 @05:06AM (#40736529)
> "regret" at leisure would make more sense

That wouldn't work at all; "regret" doesn't have an intransitive use. You have to be regretting something.

Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by bregma on Thursday June 20, 2024 @06:29AM (#40737041)
You also have to marry something. Maybe there's a pattern, or maybe poetry does not always follow the same grammatical specificity as prose, or maybe both.
Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by fuzztester on Thursday June 20, 2024 @05:11PM (#40743441)
you are right on both points.

there is a term for your latter point:

poetic licence:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artistic_license

aside: I realize i also kind of applied artistic licence in my comment here :), by not capitalizing the first words of my sentences, partly because feeling a bit lazy (on my mobile, typing is tedious and slow enough, even without switching case), and partly because I think single case (no concept of upper and lower case) is a better option.

sanskrit, for example, does not have upper and lower case, just one case, or maybe none.

go figure, er, i mean, go letter ;)

Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by thaumasiotes on Thursday June 20, 2024 @06:45PM (#40744265)
> You also have to marry something.

What? Where'd you learn English?

Take a look at the first two senses listed in wiktionary ( https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/marry#Etymology_1 ):

> 1. (intransitive) To enter into the conjugal or connubial state

> 2. (intransitive) To enter into marriage with one another.

Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by bregma on Saturday June 22, 2024 @07:36AM (#40758247)
Does the following sentence make sense? "I marry."

It's a transitive verb.

Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by fuzztester on Saturday June 22, 2024 @03:23PM (#40761445)
There's also "I walk", "I eat", "I run", and many more like those.
Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by thaumasiotes on Saturday June 22, 2024 @10:09PM (#40764115)
That's not an issue of the verb being obligatorily transitive, since it isn't. You really should look at some usage examples; this isn't a difficult or tricky question.

The problem in your sentence is that the plain form of a verb is used for states, not activities, and marrying is an activity.

"I am marrying today" is just as intransitive, but without the artificially induced grammatical error.

Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by bregma on Sunday June 23, 2024 @08:39AM (#40767027)
"I am marrying today."

That's not a valid sentence, unless the person you are to wed is named "Today". Such is stuff as Abbott and Costello cashed in on.

Of course, taken in context there may be implied antecedents in spoken dialog. Spoken dialog is often incomplete and rife with implied antecedents and frequently does not follow the rules of grammer. Sentence fragments and one-word sentences can about because of that.

Re:The return of pneumatic tubes by throawayjune on Sunday June 23, 2024 @11:40AM (#40768247)
It is valid and maybe easier to see with a comma. “I am marrying, today.” “Today, I will be marrying.” It is valid in the context of “i will be engaging in marriage, today (“today, i am entering into a covenant of marriage”)” but it wouldn’t be something that would be heard very often. it’s a more archaic usage.