Example sentences of "n't have been " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | ‘ Well , if he was repairing the machinery , it ca n't have been safe in the first place , can it ? ’ |
| 2 | ‘ My dear fellow , we spend our time here working on things that should n't have been said , but unless they are , ’ he added thoughtfully , ‘ nobody gets anywhere . |
| 3 | ‘ There ca n't have been a toad . |
| 4 | When Stavrogin , who ‘ poisoned ’ Kirillov , and who also kills himself , wrote that letter to Dasha Shatov asking her to come and be his nurse , his mind wo n't have been bent either on or away from suicide ; he was neutrally wondering whether she hoped ‘ to set up some aim for me at last ’ . |
| 5 | ‘ It wo n't have been on a weighing machine since it left the village where it was grown . ’ |
| 6 | Ian Botham ca n't have been expecting to have such a free winter , but he 's certainly filling it innovatively with a national tour of his show , An Evening With Ian Botham . |
| 7 | The irrational thought almost occurs that Shakespeare could n't have been that smart if he did n't realise that he had here a performer who can turn sows ' ears into silk purses , and silk purses into live butterflies . |
| 8 | ‘ If I 'd done it then , perhaps I would n't have been fit to go to the Olympics and worlds , and I 'd hate to be sitting here now thinking I could have won . |
| 9 | See , the other week there , I was on beat duty and this wee nipper , could n't have been more than 6 or 7 , came round the corner and says to me , ‘ Fuck off , ya black bastard . ’ |
| 10 | Mark 's wishes could n't have been better fulfilled as she ended up in a small tourist camp in Kanha National Park . |
| 11 | If Bernie had n't been around we would have been a band , and we would have been a good band but we would n't have been the band . |
| 12 | We knew he was the owner of the club and — while he ca n't have been more than four-foot-nine inches tall — we knew that Soho was run by Maltese gangsters just like him . |
| 13 | ‘ Looking back on it the plan could n't have been simpler but we must have rehearsed it forty times . |
| 14 | ‘ I would n't have been a doctor , ’ he shivered with tiredness , ill at ease by the very suggestion of a shape other than his own . |
| 15 | ‘ All the coaches in the world would n't have been of any use if you had n't had courage . |
| 16 | Both Clare and Elaine could n't have been happier . |
| 17 | She protested that they should n't have been put on there without her authority , and the farm chaps laughed and said , ‘ You wo n't be wanting that again . ’ |
| 18 | ‘ Making ten films is truly boring , ’ he says ‘ If I had worked continuously with the same cameraman , I would n't have been able to get up in the morning . |
| 19 | Scunthorpe survived largely because Futcher thought he was offside when he was n't and Deary was when he should n't have been — his 81st-minute goal being disallowed to the despair of the home fans and the delight of those setting off across the black hills . |
| 20 | If it had n't been a yorker I 'd have looked an absolute idiot , I would n't have been in the same street , let alone cricket ground . |
| 21 | Obviously I felt for him , I would n't have been too delighted if our positions had been reversed ; and they could so easily have been . |
| 22 | The man moved efficiently past a child who had succeeded in entangling her pony 's reins with her feet and who was being blasted for it by a girl who could n't have been more than sixteen , but was sounding like a woman three times her age . |
| 23 | I should n't have been content to be just a wife . ’ |
| 24 | But it could n't have been Rebel . |
| 25 | He could n't have been more than quarter of an hour having his tea . |
| 26 | He rose from his enormous desk and lit a big cigar — it could n't have been a Havana — and strutted around his vast office like a peacock , admiring his reflection in the long mirror . |
| 27 | Small doses of non-sophistication were amusing as a break from other things , but he would n't have been able to bear all that romance day in , day out . |
| 28 | ‘ We thought you would n't have been like you were in that interview unless you knew something that — that you were n't telling people . |
| 29 | It could n't have been Gloria , for Gloria knew that Dot always slept in her vest and knickers . |
| 30 | He would n't have been able to see well enough even to lock for them . |