Re: English question
| From: | Padraic Brown <agricola@...> |
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| Date: | Friday, November 30, 2001, 23:04 |
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Am 30.11.01, Josh Roth yscrifef:
> Are you saying it's not an adjective period, or that while it may be for me,
> it's not for others?
Nik showed me the possibility of it being an adjective. For me,
it's an adverb; but I kind of like that copula+adjective thingy
in this case. I'm not saying that adjectives can't follow nouns.
Only that when adjectives that follow nouns also modify verbs, they
are in fact adverbs.
> If the former, what's your definition of an adverb? Or rather, why is "good"
> an adverb there?
Because it modifies the verb.
> Are you saying it because you believe in any V x situation,
> x must be an adverb, or in other words, adjectives just can't come after
> verbs, so if it comes after a verb it must be an adverb?
If the word that comes after modifies the verb, then it's an adverb.
> Or some other reason
> ? In my speech, I can't use "good" where I can use other words I know to be
> adverbs (e.g. He reads slowly vs. *He reads good) but I can use it where I
> can use other words I know to be adjectives, unless I've been wrong about
> their identity this whole time (e.g. He reads a difficult book, He reads a
> good book).
That's _Good_ English! I was taught the same in school - say "She
reads quickly", not "She reads fast", "I don't feel well", not "I
don't feel good". But that didn't stop me from using simple adjectives
as adverbs.
> Even with the same example as above:
> He felt happy.
> He felt fashionable.
> He felt good.
I read the first two as adjectives, the third as adverb. Something
interesting is going on there. I suspect there is an understood
"...himself to be..." in the first two that wants in the third.
> vs.
> *He felt happily.
> *He felt fashionably.
> ?He felt well. -This is OK for me because of hypercorrection due to
> prescriptivist teachers (or was it my mother?) who said you need an adverb,
> not an adjective, after a verb - if not for that, I'm sure it wouldn't be.
Then we're ultimately in agreement over good/well after feel!
Padraic.
--
Bethes gwaz vaz ha leal.