Use of singular noun in adverbial clause for plural antecedent?

GreenCat · 18 Sep 2009

akaitsume1 said:
People seem to have a lot of interpretations of this sentence, but I think they inflated it a little. In most of Bradbury's work, the simplest answer usually makes the most sense.

"But most of the houses, darkened, were sleeping already and there were a few light-less places where the occupants of a dwelling sat talking low night talk on their front porches."

What he meant was that on the porches of the few houses with families that were still awake, those families (or parts of it) were outside talking. The "occupants of a dwelling" would be the people who live in that house, and they, like a few of their sleepless neighbors, are out on their dark porches, speaking quietly to each other.

To make it clearer, using "a dwelling" emphasizes the family unit. Saying "those dwellings" lumps everyone outside into one group. I haven't read that story in particular, but emphasizing the tiny pockets of people gives the image more of a paranoid feeling(for me). What are they talking about? Do their sleepless neighbors agree?

Well, it is not like people had different interpretations, rather I asked people for different possible ways to read it because I wanted to know the process of interpretation and possible connotations maybe invoked.

To make it clearer, using "a dwelling" emphasizes the family unit. Saying "those dwellings" lumps everyone outside into one group. I haven't read that story in particular, but emphasizing the tiny pockets of people gives the image more of a paranoid feeling(for me). What are they talking about? Do their sleepless neighbors agree?

"emphasizing the tiny pockets of people gives the image more of a paranoid feeling"
Oh, thanks. No one explicitly mentioned that before I think. Leaving the discussion of whether it is grammatically good practice aside,I do agree that employing first-person prospect in writing does seem to form more vivid and dynamic images in readers' mind.

It is good to know because one day I would love to write something of quality that people can enjoy reading

Thank you for posting akaitsume1

p.s
By the way this word "image", someone told me that the Japanese usage of the word to refer to a mental picture of someone's likely behaviour and way of thinking or observed and assumed character does not exist in English. Is this true?

Use of singular noun in adverbial clause for plural antecedent?

GreenCat

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