Would anyone like to help with this?

Question

Hi,here is an uneffective sentence to improve which was chosen for the text book of mine for writting,
It goes like this.
"The old man returning home after eight years' absence to find that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there."

I am going to improve the sentence like these:
1.The old man returned home after eight years' absence to find that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there.

2.The old man returning home after eight years' absence found that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there.

3.The old man returned home after eight years' absence,and found that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there.

4.The old man, returning home after eight years' absence,found that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there.

5.The old man having returned home after eight years' absence found that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there.

Note:If there is any problem in them,please help correct.

Addition:Do these inner changes make differece in meaning?

Answer 1

Gone Car - All five of your sentences are essentially grammatically correct. Sentences #2 and #4 differ only in the presence or absence of the two commas. I think #4 is easier to understand and therefore preferable to #2. I think in current English usage the comma in sentence #3 would be better omitted. In sentence #5 adding commas after "man" and "absence" would make the sentence clearer so I would use the commas here.

As far as differences in meaning is concerned, the sentences all are very close in meaning, with only very slight subtle differences related to tense. Sentences #2 and #4 are closest in tense to the original. Therefore, taking both grammar and tense into consideration, I would choose sentence #4 as the best improvement of the original (incorrect) sentence.

-m

Answer 2

Number 1 looks good with the 'congruance' of "returned.... to find". Number 4 looks about the clearest because of the commas. Maybe 2 and 5 should have some too.

Are you able to change the order of information in your improvements (obviously without trying to change the meaning)? If so, what about;
After eight years' abscence, the old man returned home to find that all the neighbors he had (previously) known were no longer there.

Good Luck!

Answer 3

Having returned home after an eight years' absence, the old man found that all the neighbours he had known were no longer there.

or

The old man, upon returning home after eight years' of absence, found that all the neighbours he had known were no longer there.

ps...it would probably be more to the point to say that "all the neighbours he had known, no longer LIVED there instead of WERE there.

Answer 4

They all look correct to me, except that in the last one, I'd add two commas: "The old man, having returned after eight years' absence, found that all the neighbors he had known were no longer there."

And no, I don't think any of your changes would change the meaning.

Answer 5

Consider the following turn of phrase, instead:

The old man returned home, after having been gone for 8 years, and realized that all his old-time [alternative suggestion = “former”] neighbors were no longer there.

This is an example of what I call “modern pseudo-street prose”. The question is: Do you have the courage to use it?

P.S. Here is the Golden Rule of all dynamic and evolving languages (English included): You could even go as far as inventing your own grammar (not slang or colloquial forms of speech, mind you), as long as you can manage to make yourself easily understood.

Answer 6

Its number 4
1, 3, and 5 all change the tense of the verb, therefore the meaning of the sentance, and number 2 needs a comma after the word man and abcense.

Answer 7

#2 & 5 are easiest to read and make the most sense.