Otto Jespersen, the great Danish grammarian, took a guess: people sometimes begin speaking before they know what their true subject will be.
He studied in Paris, and was considered a great grammarian, poet and physicist.
Two great grammarians had a titanic spat in the 1920's over the use of the possessive in this sentence: "Women having the vote reduces men's political power."
Thus, the sanhedrin of great grammarians agrees with the pragmatic mouse who said to his colleagues, "To hell with the cheese - let's get out of the trap."
I wish I had the support of the great grammarians, but I can do without it; here I stand.
Subjunctive mood- He was a great grammarian!
Otto Jespersen, the great grammarian, explained the disagreement as an attraction between is and the first part of the compound subject, in this case the singular dreamer.
It has been described as "an encyclopedia of the opinions and views of the great Sanskrit grammarians of antiquity" (Suryakant Bali).
I ran it past great grammarians on both sides of the Atlantic.
Similarly, the great Sanskrit grammarian, Bhartrhari, also says: " The Word has neither a beginning nor an end."