"There's" + plural NP

Thomas   Sun Jan 28, 2007 6:30 pm GMT
I don't want to start a discussion about the correctness of "there's" in sentences like "There's two books on the table", the fact is that this construction is very common and the most natural way to express that concept for probably a lot of speakers of North American English.
My question is rather what, if anything, this "there's" is a contraction of. The problem with the "obvious" answer "there is" is that many speakers who have no problem with the above sentence find "There is two books on the table" ungrammatical (You can still find this construction quite often, but I always assume it's a mistake in the sense that people are transforming their colloquial "there's" into nonstandard "there is").

So, my question, addressed to those of you who find the sentence grammatical, is how would you contradict someone who says "There's two books on the table."?

You can certainly avoid the issue by saying things like "No, that's not true", but could you say any of the following?

(A) No, there isn't.
(B) No, there aren't.
(C) No, there's not.

Thanks
User   Sun Jan 28, 2007 6:47 pm GMT
(B) No, there aren't.

It drives me crazy when people say "There's" with a plural NP.
28EV   Sun Jan 28, 2007 10:29 pm GMT
"It drives me crazy when people say 'There's' with a plural NP."

Get used to it.