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actually feel or actually felt?

Last posted Sep 14, 2018 at 11:26PM EDT. Added Sep 14, 2018 at 08:04AM EDT
3 posts from 3 users

Not a native speaker here, but I think the word "actually" is a bit unnecessary here.

I think in this case it's "actually feel" since before they say "I would tell you" (present form) instead of "I would have told you" (present perfect form). It makes more sense to keep it consistent.

Though, the "if you asked me" could be interpreted in two different ways, either they're saying "if you were to ask me" (as in, a possibility in the future) or "if you had asked me" (as in, a possibility in the past).

In the former case, it would be "feel" while in the latter, it would be "felt":

It's poorly worded. There's ambiguity over what the tense of the second sentence should be. The character's speaking in past tense (asked, was) but shifts to present tense when paraphrasing their thoughts at the time the question was asked. The issue lies in the use paraphrasing, part of which uses the past tense ("you asked me what I was feeling") and part the present tense ("I actually feel absolutely nothing").

Direct quotation could fix the problem:

If you asked me, "How are you feeling?" I would tell you, "I feel absolutely nothing…"

Or redoing the paraphrase to align the tenses:

If you asked me how I was feeling, I'd tell you I felt absolutely nothing…
Skeletor-sm

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