As I hear and read, only just is an emphasizing ‘time-expression’ and only just in time is perhaps the most often its use.
Is it also all right to use it in this way: She said faintly, “Only just once”. ?
Or would only once and only just […one time] sound better to you?
If you get the simple answer ‘Only just.’, what meaning do you suppose?
Related to the current time moment (‘right now’) or to the ‘counter’ (only once)?
Or just can’t suppose without a context?
As I understand, only not and not only have quite different meanings, almost opposite
The same difference is in Russian.
Only not in English. - logical :), OK
but in I’m only not divorced because I was never married. (BNC)
it sounds a bit confusing to me.
Could you reword the last sentence replacing only not in it by some equivalent expression?
Hi Tamara
So sorry. Yes, “is” should be there. I guess in my cut-and-paste haste, I ended up leaving it out.
No. In fact, I’m having trouble thinking of any example where “just only” would work without sounding like a completely unnecessary and unnatural redundancy.
For example, you could say: I have only one PC.
-or- I have just one PC.
BUT NOT: I have just only one PC.
When you combine those two words the other way around (only just), “only” has the sense of “simply” or “merely” and “just” has a sense of “by a narrow margin” (in other words, a sort of closeness to something):
He’s only just come. => The word just indicates a “closeness” to now.
He only just managed to swim the Channel. => The word just indicates a closeness to failure (i.e., he didn’t manage it easily).
