Re: "write him" was Re: More questions

On Wed, 26 Nov 2003, Stephen Mulraney wrote:

> John Cowan wrote:
> > Tim May scripsit:
>
>
> >>Here's how it works in my speech (which I imagine to be essentially
> >>representative of British English, at least, in this respect).
>
>
> > My 'lect agrees on all points except for "He wrote her" being grammatical.
>
> I think most people will agree on that. In a way, it's what's most curious
> about the issue - there's a single form disallowed, for a single (?) verb.
> Ah, the tyrant Usage.
I agree with you entirely: another example of Australia maintaining it's
British heritage instead of copying America (which of course happens; the
PP of 'to get' can be either 'got' or 'gotten', at a whim).

But the exception is 'write me' and 'tell me' being acceptible. The vast
majority of verbs like that would need 'to', at least as far as I can
think (e.g. *sing me, *give me, *throw me (meaning 'throw me (something)').

--
Tristan

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