word choice - Use of "memory"


Does the sentence



His memory is lost



have these two meanings?



  1. It could mean that our memory of him is lost.

  2. It could mean that he has lost his memory.



Answer



‘Memory’ can certainly mean both (1) the facility to remember and (2) the remembrance of a person or thing. In support of (2), the OED cites this from George Orwell’s ‘1984’: ‘His mother's memory tore at his heart because she had died loving him.’ However, while ‘His memory is lost’ is a grammatical sentence and capable, just about, of bearing either of those two meanings, it is an unlikely sentence. ‘He has lost his memory’ less ambiguously conveys sense (1), while ‘People have forgotten him’ is a clearer expression of sense (2).


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