What this 'd stands for?

“If we would of (have)” Even though Reddit grammarians get riled up by the use of “of” for “have”, many 20th century authors used this spelling pronunciation for casual or lower class speech. Just as we might write “gonna” today.

If you continue reading on the next page, you will see a character saying "Oggsford" when they are talking about Oxford University. The author (F. Scott Fitzgerald) is deliberately writing the dialogue as it is spoken by the character, which is why you're seeing unconventional spellings. BTW, I used to live in an apartment in a building where F. Scott Fitzgerald took dance lessons as a boy when he was growing up in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

‘If we would of raised the blinds we would of seen daylight’ Which itself is a somewhat improper way of saying ‘If we would have raised the blinds we would have seen daylight’

It's deliberately incorrect speech that's designed to make the speaker sound more working-class. *We'd of* would more properly be written *we would have* or *we'd have*, which many people in casual speech will shorten to something that sounds like *we'd've*, which is a homophone of *we'd of*. There is no standard written contraction for *we would have* that captures how we say it when speaking, so to represent this speech in dialogue people will sometimes use *we'd've* or *we'd of*, neither of which are grammatically correct English.

> "if we'd of raised the blinds" The more formal version of this would be written as "if we would have raised the blinds." Several things happen to shorten the sentence in quick, conversational speech. The dialogue is written accordingly in order to convey that they character is talking casually and not using a very formal dialect. It makes the dialogue sound more working class. > "we'd of seen daylight" Similarly, this would be more formally written as "we would have seen daylight." One thing happening each time is that the character, like most English speakers, isn't putting much care into the pronunciation of little auxiliary verbs like *would* and *have*. Writing "we would" as the contraction "we'd" is very standard in English writing, as long as you're not writing in an extremely formal tone. Another thing happening, and likely the most confusing for a non-native speaker, is that the author is writing the dialogue with the word "of" replacing the word "have." Many if not most native speakers naturally pronounce these words almost identically in this situation, making them homophones once you omit the initial /h/ sound. Native speakers actually commonly make the mistake of writing "of" in this case as well, although it's also not considered correct. It tends to invite accusations of low education, which isn't always fair, although you could think of it as the type of error someone might make who hasn't done any formal writing since grade school. Some authors might choose to use a double contraction like "we'd've" which is surprising at first glance but it's a valid word and does capture this process.

The character is speaking incorrectly - “would have”, “could of” is a common mistake native speakers make in place of “would have”, “could have”, etc.  The sentence underlined expands out to “If we would have raised the blinds, we would have seen daylight”.  Further standardised, this would be “if we had opened the blinds, we would have seen daylight.”

We'd = We Would She'd = She Would He'd = He Would I'd = I would They'd = They would Example: If you told me before I left, ***I'd*** have brought the ice for the party. If you told me before I left , ***I would*** have brought the ice for the party Also another common contraction is have: They've = They have We've = We have I've = I have

A lot of people have already mentioned the would have / would of mixup, but I'm not sure why no one's pointed out that it's the contraction of would have, "would've", that sounds like "would of". Most commentors seem to be suggesting that it's "would have" that's being misheard and then misspelled, rather than just "would've".

> if we'd of raised the blinds we'd of seen daylight > *if we would have raised the blinds we would have seen daylight* In this context, *have* sounds the same as *of*. It's quite common for native speakers not to be aware of the distinction or to mix them up in writing. The author might be trying to imply that the speaker is unsophisticated, or it might just be a mistake on the author's part.

The phrase “we would have” can be abbreviated to “we would’ve”. The second word is pronounced like “wood-iv” which somewhere along the line got mistaken as “would of”. So then people took “we would of” and further abbreviated it to “we’d of”. The meaning is “we would have”, or more correctly abbreviated to “we would’ve” or even “we’d’ve”.

You're reading The Great Gatsby, yet have a grasp of English so limited so as not to have come across the abbreviated version of 'we would'? I confess I'm impressed; and slightly jealous.

It drives me crazy when people say “of” instead of “have.” It should be “we’d have raised,” which would be the contraction of “we would have raised.”

“We’d’ve” is a casual, shortened version of “we would have.” When spoken aloud, “we’d’ve” sounds the same as “we’d of.” This is a common grammatical error that comes up in English - writing “would of,” “should of,” or “could of” instead of would’ve, should’ve, could’ve. As you and others have noted, though, this was likely an intentional choice by the author to communicate something about the character. :)

The "d" is short for "would." Paring it with "of" creates "would of," an incorrect version of "would have."

"d" stands for johnson:))

"We would have" becomes "We would've" becomes "We'd've" (which looks strange) which then gets misheard / turn into "We'd of" "Would of" is a very common 'mistake' in English. Same with "Did good" instead of "Did well".

Hello, I'm a Chinese. I'm just starting to learn English. I'm not sure which learning method to adopt. Could you please suggest which step to take first and which one to do next? At present, most people in China first memorize words, and then learn listening, speaking, reading and writing. Should I do the same?

Like every other ‘d, it stands for “would.” The correct phrase is ‘would have,” which is pronounced and misspelled as “would have.” The whole thing can be spelled “we’d’ve.”

They meant “we’d have” not “we’d of”, but the “we‘d” is a contraction for “we would” here (it can also be use for “we had”). Presumably they are conveying the affectations of the character’s manner of speaking, which is not always properly grammatical.

“We’d” is “we would”. So “We’d of” is “We would of”. But that’s incorrect, and it SHOULD be “We’d would HAVE” or “We’d have”

"Had" or "would" and "would", but "of" should be "have". In written English, the "have" (of) is usually omitted, but it's normal in speech. Writing it as "of" in dialogue is acceptable - because that's how a lot of people say it, even though it's actually "have" (or 've).

Replace the 'of's in the sentence with 'have'. It's an annoying spoken defect some people have.

Agreed with the below - it’s just bad English.

We’d’ve******

As a short answer - we'd is a contraction of we would.

"We'd of" (spoken casual) = we would have(formal/completely written out) Its an informal spoken turn of phrase, where "would have" becomes shortened. You'll often see this same issue in "could've" vs "could of"

"We would have" is the correct statement, but for one reason or another "we would of" is often used. "would of" is incorrect in several ways, but I think the sounds are similar enough that people often don't realize they are using the wrong word. This author is probably trying to emulate the way this particular person's peers speak (eg. their neighbors, coworkers, etc), and that may have some implications about the character's personality or background.

...."we **had** of raised the blinds, we **would** of seen daylight." Here, the second "of" is grammatically incorrect. It should be: "*we would* **have** *seen daylight.*" The character in this book is meant to be the kind of person who would get that wrong: it's technically not right within general English rules, but dialectical.

"We'd" is "we do" abbreviation

It is in place of the word ‘would’ and is meant to represent the speaking persons dialect as having a slight drawl. If you say the line very fast ‘if we would have raised the blinds we would have seen daylight’ you can see how it could be spoken and the ‘would’ can be de-voiced to just ‘d’

We had, we would, or we should, is what we'd be typing out without the 'd.

To add to all the correct answers, this would be pronounced as "weeduv" all kind of run together.