Example sentences of "[pers pn] have been trying [to-vb] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | You are a very intelligent girl and you have read a great deal — no , I mean it ; one thing you ca n't say is that I have been trying to flatter you — but you do n't know everything , you do n't know the French , the real French ( though the Fourniers are quite an example of one kind ) , you can have no idea of what life among us is like , the attitudes , the demands ; if you like , the values . |
| 2 | ‘ I have been trying to elicit what is happening in Scotland . |
| 3 | I have been trying to draw attention away from the great cities , which were quite uncharacteristic of the scene in our centuries , and to focus on the small or middling sort ; and here we meet the doctrine so brilliantly established in recent decades by Philip Jones : that the Italian cities were essentially market towns in origin , in which nobles and knights and farmers and peasants had a common interest ; very often the knights lived as much in the towns as in their country fortresses or castles . |
| 4 | When the young laird of Dunvegan , Norman Macleod , came down late for breakfast , Johnson ticked him off , saying laziness was worse than toothache : ‘ I have been trying to cure my laziness all my life , and could not do it . ’ |
| 5 | In his Chicago lectures , for example , he described how certain passages of Notes toward the Definition of Culture had been exposed as a " mass of contradictions " and , at the end , he also made a rueful disclaimer — " I am quite aware that I have been trying to persuade , although I may not be quite sure of what " . |
| 6 | His thin , pale face contorted as he said , " Well , I sha n't go into the seamy details … the more basic facets of life , but on a cleaner if more frustrating theme , I have been trying to seduce that lovely Dickson boy over the last week . |
| 7 | ‘ My friend Bernice and I have been trying to work out how to stabilize the moons , ’ he said . |
| 8 | I have been trying to make it more commercial and wearable for evening looks , and the staff are now using the technique on clients especially for weddings . ’ |
| 9 | I have been trying to learn how to make things happen ever since . |
| 10 | I have been trying to hatch brine shrimps to feed fry , but the eggs just settle on the bottom of the tank , in spite of aeration . |
| 11 | FOR months now I have been trying to contain excitement at the thought of the compact disc . |
| 12 | Q I have been trying to locate a manufacturer of a walking boot or walking shoe which is synthetic , ie not leather or suede for a vegetarian friend , but so far have had no luck . |
| 13 | My excuse for this lengthy and amateur digression into history is that I have been trying to show how I think geology got into the hands of the theoreticians who were conditioned by the social and political history of their day more than by observations in the field . |
| 14 | As I 'm going senile + reliving my second childhood , I have been trying to keep Gav 's fabulous tex fixture list up to date . |
| 15 | Since then I have been trying to gain recognition from Technics . |
| 16 | Then he said to Rain : ‘ You could say I have been trying to help Barbara Coleman , helping her to keep out of trouble . |
| 17 | SIR — Since Peterborough reported that the Maastricht Treaty was being sold by HMSO ( March 19 ) I have been trying to obtain a copy without success . |
| 18 | Weather gets nastier here — my week in 21–28 October was warm and wet , so I lazed and read and ate — read a lot and ate a lot which , given the state of the bathroom scales , enriched both mind and body ( HA HA ) so I have been trying to eat and drink less . |
| 19 | ‘ I have been trying to get a video of the game for the past four or five years , but I have never had any success . ’ |
| 20 | ‘ I have been trying to get the traders out for eight years , but there have been so many obstructions . ’ |
| 21 | ‘ I have been trying to get him out of the pram to get him ready for nursery but not now . |
| 22 | It may just be the book you have been trying to find for years ! |
| 23 | In the meantime , I understand you have been trying to find out how the Carmel Woods inquiry went . |
| 24 | What we have been trying to do is to find " subsidy-free " prices which will cover the costs of the enterprise . |
| 25 | Through surveys and informal questioning and , more recently , partnerships we have been trying to do that . ’ |
| 26 | We have lost it , I think , because we have been trying to lose the people and feelings it used to describe . |
| 27 | We have been trying to lay on chances for each other . |
| 28 | I think that what we 're really looking for is a stimulating , exciting involvement of parents , of students , of teachers , of everyone who has an interest in the success of a school , and I think for some years at Cardinal Newman we have been trying to create this open society , which gives access at all levels to all the children and to their parents , and we do n't want to close the society in any shape or form . |
| 29 | We have been trying to din into the heads of the electricity boards an inkling that different people are susceptible to different levels of radiation exposure and that there is no safe level . |
| 30 | We have been trying to stop the deteriorating effects of ageing on our skin since the times of the pharaohs . |