Guestmudgeon Deepa Nirmal
lays a trap for lay and lie...
I have lived in the US for almost three years now and just can’t get over the usage of
lay for lie. Can you let sleeping dogs lay? "I laid down on the
bed." Laid what down?
Even educated people seem to have universally accepted the substitution, and the word
lie appears to be left only with the meaning "to tell an
untruth".
What’s so hard to
understand? Lie is intransitive and lay is transitive. If you don’t have an object, use
lie!
Excellent mnemonic device,
Deepa. As for "I laid down on the bed", you do have to admit
that in speech, it's rather difficult to tell if someone is saying "I
lay down..." or "I laid down..." because of the initial d
in down. However, you are correct in that most people don't use
the verb to lie unless they mean "to prevaricate".
Part of the problem comes in the conjugations of to lay and to lie.
Lie, lay, lain.
Lay, laid, laid. People
can't keep them straight and so just give up. When was the last time you heard
someone say "He has lain there for 2 days"?
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