To have / To + infinitive

Hi, Tony C,

@Tony C posted:

In the sentence below, is it grammatically correct or I should omit the “have”? And also, do I need to use “both” so it becomes I hope you both are well.

Thank you for reaching out and it was lovely to have met up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding and I hope you are well.

You shouldn't omit the perfect infinitive 'to have met'. It refers to something that did happen in the past. The usage of 'both' is optional here. If I were you, I would use it.  

Hi Ahmed,

Thanks so much. But is it correct not to use perfect infinitive as I often see people just use to infinitive. What are your thoughts on this? I asked my native friend and he told me that to have met in my context above sounds weird

i.e. Thank you for reaching out and it was lovely to meet up with you. Another example is: It was lovely to meet you this morning and have a chance to discuss so many things.

@Tony C posted:

Hi Ahmed,

Thanks so much. But is it correct not to use perfect infinitive as I often see people just use to infinitive. What are your thoughts on this? I asked my native friend and he told me that to have met in my context above sounds weird

i.e. Thank you for reaching out and it was lovely to meet up with you. Another example is: It was lovely to meet you this morning and have a chance to discuss so many things.

The perfect infinitive is grammatically correct here and 'to + bare infinitive' is also correct. You can use either of them. I prefer the perfect infinitive in your example as it indicates that the whole occasion was in the past before you separated, (but not now).

@Tony C posted:

In the sentence below, is it grammatically correct or I should omit the “have”? And also, do I need to use “both” so it becomes I hope you both are well.

Thank you for reaching out and it was lovely to have met up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding and I hope you are well.

Hi, Tony and Ahmed—While I agree with Ahmed that the perfect infinitive is not incorrect in your example, Tony, I myself would use a normal infinitive: "It was lovely to meet up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding."

You could alternatively use the gerund: "It was lovely meeting up with you and your wife at Jack's weddinng." Nobody would use the perfect gerund there: (??) "It was lovely having met up with you and your wife a Jack's wedding."

A context in which I might use the perfect infinitive is one in which the event did not take place: "It would have been lovely to have met up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding." But, even there, "to meet" could be used instead.

As to your other question, Tony, you can use "you both" or "you." The second-person pronoun, "you," can be singular or plural. "You both" just makes the intended plural meaning. You can also say "you two," "the two of you," etc.

By the way, I recommend dividing your sentence into three. While you have not written a run-on sentence, there is no reason to conjoin the three independent clauses. Instead of a triply compound sentence, use three simple ones:

• Thank you for reaching out. It was lovely to meet you and your wife at Jack's wedding. I hope you two are well.

@David, Moderator posted:

While I agree with Ahmed that the perfect infinitive is not incorrect in your example, Tony, I myself would use a normal infinitive: "It was lovely to meet up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding."

You could alternatively use the gerund: "It was lovely meeting up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding." Nobody would use the perfect gerund there: (??) "It was lovely having met up with you and your wife a Jack's wedding."

A context in which I might use the perfect infinitive is one in which the event did not take place: "It would have been lovely to have met up with you and your wife at Jack's wedding." But, even there, "to meet" could be used instead.

I think another case where the perfect infinitive would work is that in which we express our current feelings about a past event:

- It is lovely to have met up with you.

Thanks all, I sincerely appreciate it. By the way, David mentioned that I have not written a run-on-sentence. A run on sentence is where there are two or more independent clauses that have not been conjoined properly. Is run on sentence bad and therefore we should avoid writing a run on sentence?

What David objected to was the unnecessary repetition of "and" to join those sentences, which reveals a poor writing style.