Re: Question about transitivity/intransitivity
| From: | John Cowan <jcowan@...> |
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| Date: | Wednesday, May 28, 2003, 20:21 |
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Christophe Grandsire scripsit:
> Note that English and French are quite liberal in that respect. But there
> are other languages for which transitive verbs *must* be used with an
> object, even when you don't want to specify it. In other words, in those
> languages a sentence like *"I eat" is ungrammatical.
Chinese is full of obligatory transitive verbs with dummy objects: "to eat"
in Chinese is "to eat rice", which is only sensible since rice (or noodles)
is the staple grain, eaten at almost every meal.
--
John Cowan jcowan@reutershealth.com www.reutershealth.com www.ccil.org/~cowan
I am he that buries his friends alive and drowns them and draws them
alive again from the water. I came from the end of a bag, but no bag
went over me. I am the friend of bears and the guest of eagles. I am
Ringwinner and Luckwearer; and I am Barrel-rider. --Bilbo to Smaug
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