Could you not

[Anonymous]

Hi,
Please check these sentences and correct them.
1. Could you not make a noise?
2. Could you not say that way? I'm doing my best.
3. How could you not love me?
4. How could you not wait for me? or How could you not have waited for me? [Which tense is correct?]
5. How could you not tell me about this? or How could you not have told me about this? [Which tense is correct?]
6. Why should you not have shown it to us?
Thanks in advance.

[Pete]

1. Could you not make a noise?
-- This is correct. A problem is that it can be ambiguous. I presume it is a request that someone not make noise; that is one meaning. Consider the sentence,
- Couldn't you make a noise?
This is a request that someone make a noise. Sentence 1 can also mean this. (In speech, the intonation and amount of emphasis on the word "not" removes the ambiguity.) It would be better to re-phrase this in a positive form:
- Could you please remain quiet?

2. Could you not <strike>say</strike> speak that way? I'm doing my best. [As in #1, I recommend a positive form:
- Could you say that another way?]
3. How could you not love me? [Ok.]
4. How could you not wait for me? or How could you not have waited for me? [Which tense is correct?] [I think both sound ok and natural. I think the simple bare infinitive (wait) gives the sense of: How was it possible for you not to wait for me? The perfect infinitive (have waited) gives more emphasis to the specific event.]
5. How could you not tell me about this? or How could you not have told me about this? [Which tense is correct?] [Both are fine. See my comment above.]
6. Why should you not have shown it to us? [Ok.]