Learn English – I’d rather stay than go/to go/going home

grammaticalityverbsword-choice

Despite being reasonably fluent in English, I have no intuition for what's correct here:

I'd rather stay than go home.

I'd rather stay than to go home.

I'd rather stay than going home.

All three sound natural to me. Could you explain which variants are actually correct and point me to the relevant grammar rules? If more than one are correct, could you also comment on the nuances between them?

Best Answer

It's only logical to use the same form of "go" in the second part of the sentence as the form of "stay" in its first part. And this form of "stay" is forced by "would rather" (see e.g. http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british-grammar/verb-patterns/would-rather-would-sooner). So the only correct, and natural sounding, version is the first one:

I'd rather stay than go home.

Sentences with other forms of "go" can also be formed, but that would require changing the first part of the sentence. For example:

I'd prefer staying here to going home.

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