[dataflow]

> She would have had to have been being watched.

OK, now I feel like I don't know English. Is this proper English? What does it mean? How is it different from "She would have had to have been watched"? Is the meaning clear to people? I'm scratching my head...

Did you mean "She would have had to have felt like she's being watched"?

[sfblah]

I’m a native English speaker here and it’s clear to me. I also think it’s somewhat tricky to express it more succinctly without changing the sentence a fair bit.

Essentially it means “it must have been the case that, at the moment we’re speaking of, someone was watching her.”

Your sentence is slightly different, in that it implies that, in general, someone was watching her during the timeframe we’re talking about, but not necessarily in the exact instant we’re talking about. Also, like the example above, your version could mean she’s someone who in general is watched (like the person who generally lives in Berlin), as opposed to someone being watched right during the instant we’re talking about.

Complicated!

[shawxe]

> Essentially it means “it must have been the case that, at the moment we’re speaking of, someone was watching her.”

Another native English speaker here. This would be how I would parse "She had to have been being watched," but I think it's not quite the full picture in this sentence's case. It's important to note that the "would" adds the implication that this conclusion is being drawn based upon some other (possibly unspoken) observation or proposition.

I would say the meaning is probably closer to "In order for some unspoken condition to be true, it must also be true that, during the moment of time in the past about which we are speaking, someone was watching her."

[sfblah]

You’re right. I was doing it on my phone and forgot that word was even there.

[dataflow]

AH! Ok, I think I distilled it down to something simpler: It seems to be similar to the difference between "I would've been spoken to" vs. "I would've been being spoken to". Is that correct?

Ugh, I have to admit it seems technically "correct" after all :-) but with such a painful (and uncommon) sentence structure that it makes you question if it's right...

[reshlo]

The former is past perfect[1], and the latter is past perfect progressive.[2]

There are subtleties involved, but the most basic use case is that the former refers to an action that took place before some point in the past (to which the sentence refers), while the latter refers to an action that was still happening at that past point.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_of_English_verb_forms#Pas...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_of_English_verb_forms#Pas...

[lmm]

That's perfectly normal English yes.

"She would have had to have been watched" means she would have had to have been watched at that moment (e.g. because someone was watching the area where she did whatever it was), whereas "being watched" implies that the watching was ongoing and therefore that someone was continuously watching her at the time.

[sharken]

Admittedly English is not my primary language, but "She would have had to have been being watched" seems to be a construct used in a class, but not something you would hear in day-to-day English.

[denton-scratch]

Native english speaker here.

It's a very contorted phrase. I struggle to think of a context in which it makes sense. I honestly don't know what it's supposed to mean. It's a mixture of subjunctive mood and passive voice, both of which detract from clarity.

You can make unclear grammatical constructions in any language. If your aim is clarity, and not obfuscation, then you just eliminate tangled grammar such as this example.

I will attempt to offer a re-phrasing with added context, though:

"The only way that anyone could have known X about her, would be if she were being observed."

(Many english speakers would substitute "was" for "were", because the subjunctive mood is rarely taught to schoolchildren in the UK. That is to say, colloquial english is generally pretty sloppy.)

If a native english speaker like me struggles with an english phrase, there's something wrong with that phrase. If I find myself constructing a phrase like that, my first instinct is that my thoughts must be unclear, because my words are unclear. I'd consider thinking again, and perhaps even re-writing an entire paragraph, just to avoid a phrase like that.

The subjunctive in German is routine and explicit. Indeed, the word "were" in my re-phrasing is pronounced in parts of northeast of england to rhyme with "bear", because it comes from the germanic subjunctive "wäre". But in general, subjunctives in English are concealed - we don't use subjunctive forms of verbs much, the listener is supposed to infer subjunctive mood from the presence of words like "if" and "would".

Twain is winding us up; after all, he was a satirist. The German language is pretty regular, compared with English. It's quite easy to learn. English must be a nightmare to learn, as a foreigner.

[lmm]

Obviously the situation is fairly rare, but it sounds like a perfectly natural thing to say when it's true. I don't think it's an artificial example at all (whereas e.g. no-one actually says "buffalo" as a verb).

[dataflow]

> it sounds like a perfectly natural thing to say when it's true

It doesn't sound natural to me at all; it sounds incredibly awkward to me. In a situation like that, I think people would say something like "someone would've been watching her at that moment".

[lmm]

"someone would've had have been" doesn't sound remotely natural. "someone must've been watching her" would be legitimate, but doesn't have the same connotations; it humanises the watcher, whereas "she must've had been being watched" suggests it could have been an organization rather than an individual, and so feels more sinister.

[dataflow]

If you're talking about being watched at a particular moment, you're not talking about "an organization" watching; you're talking about a person. And whether it's sinister or not is pretty beside the point. I'm saying that phrasing is pretty darn unnatural English, sinister or not.

(And I meant to write "would've"; the "would've had have been" was just a typo...)

[ddxxdd]

I feel like I'm being gaslighted by half the people in this thread that are saying that "have been being watched" is a normal phrase.

For context, I was born and raised in Northern NJ with Jamaican parents, and have lived in Michigan for the past 10 years. I have never heard anyone use grammar like this.

[lmm]

> I feel like I'm being gaslighted by half the people in this thread that are saying that "have been being watched" is a normal phrase.

I assure you the feeling is mutual :/. It really does sound perfectly normal to me. I can easily imagine e.g. Jonathan Creek saying exactly that.

[cycomanic]

Maybe this is what you are saying, but doesn't "... have been watched" imply that the being watched is finished, compared to have been being watched" implies a that the watching is (or might be) still ongoing, i.e. the use of simple past vs present perfect continuous(?)

[lmm]

No, "have been being watched" is the past progressive. It implies that the being watched was an ongoing thing at that time, not that it's still continuing.