Patterns Of Time In English: Phase

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 216):

Temporal staging is explicit and lexicalised, with a basic system of categories as shown in Figure 5-13; for example

… but the money kept on not coming through

The combination of staging with perspective has already been referred to; note in this connection sequences such as

where the move in staging creates an increasing semantic distance between the two perspectives. Staging also extends to other categories that are not strictly temporal, which the grammar however construes as analogous: especially conation (tries to do/ succeeds in doing), and appearance (seems to be/turns out to be).