3. Syntactic position and functions of adjectives

Attributive adjectives come before their nouns and define the nouns by some fairly permanent inherent quality (a kind person, a strong man, a sleeping baby, a floating leaf, a frightened person, a healthy/fit man. Nurses look after sick people.	Predicative adjectives come after link (or copular) verbs: be, become, seem, appear, get/grow, keep, look, smell, sound, taste, turn, make. In this position Predicative adjectives refer to a more temporary quality (asleep, alive, alone, afloat, afraid, alight, alike, alive, alone, asleep, ashamed, awake, aware, well, ill): She is kind. That is kind of you.
A devilish woman, this newspaper, which boy, a disagreeable thing, a direct statement, a comic figure, an old friend, a nice little house, beautiful hands. All those three attractive girls.	She made her meaning plain. Tim felt cold. The idea sounds interesting. Veronica seems happy. They got/grew impatient. She became pale. The people seem charming. Some houses appeared old. The baby’s asleep. The ship’s still afloat. He was afraid. He’s very well. You look ill.

The meaning of early and late may depend on their position: an early/late train means a train scheduled to run early or late in the day. The train is early/late means that it is before/after its proper time.

Attributive only (such adjective can not stand without a noun)

• Relationship: er (former, latter, inner, outer, elder). In former times people lit their homes by gas, not electricity. The latter is considered safer. Let’s buy tickets for the upper class.

• Intensifying (mere, merest, utter, very, outright, out-and-out). The mere mention of fire alarmed him. He’s a mere child. A mere child could do it. It’s sheer madness/ It’s utter nonsense. My very own. What happened at the very end? It’s an outright/ out-and-out lie. Sheer waste of time/ a sheer impossibility.

• Limiting (joint, lone, only, sole, chief, main, principle). Many couples have joint bank accounts. Tom is an only child and the sole heir. The chief/main/principle reason is…A holiday is the very thing you need.

• Noun-related (chemical, coastal, earthen, maritime, nuclear, solar). A chemical formula, coastal defences, an earthen pot, maritime law, a nuclear submarine, solar energy.

• Alternative past participle (drunken, sunken). A sunken garden. ‘What shall we do with the drunken sailor?’ (song).

• Miscellaneous (indoor, outdoor, inside, outside, downtown, uptown -AmE). An indoor/ outdoor swimming pool, an inside/outside door, a downtown restaurant, an uptown area.

Order of adjectives of quality

A fairly usual order is:

a) size, b) general description, c) age, d) shape, e) colour, f) material, g) origin, h) purpose (these are really gerunds used to form compound nouns: walking stick, riding boots).

A fat old lady; a small shiny black plastic handbag; red Spanish leather riding boots; a brown German ceramic beer mug; a transparent Venetian glass flower vase; a round glass table; a big modern brick house; long flexible steel poles; a tall ancient oak tree; an expensive ill-planned wasteful project; a small suspicious official; a pale anxious girl; an inquisitive brown dog; a small round bath; a long patient queue.

Little, old, young are often used not to give information , but as part of an adjective-noun combination. Your nephew is a nice little boy. ‘ An old man and the sea’ (by E. Hemingway). That young man drives too fast. Small is better than little if we want to emphasize the size.

Usage: Adjective complementation

1. Adj + preposition. I was amazed by your news. He is good at games/ for nothing/with his mother. Henry is very different from his brother. Who’s interested in archeology? He’s too dependent on his parents. You’ll be liable to a fine for parking here. These mistakes are due to carelessness. This is similar to mine. I’m not used to/ accustomed to living like this.

2. Adj + to-infinitive. She was hard to leave. The food was delicious to eat. He was stupid to leave her. I should be thrilled to see her again. He was reluctant to leave her. She was quick to take offence. He is certain/likely/ to leave her. He is apt to forget.

3. Adj + noun clause. I’m sure (that) you’ll understand. We are uncertain if (whether) Henry can help. We are delighted (that) you’ve won the Premium Bond prize.

4. Adj + wh-word + to-infinitive. We are uncertain how/when/where to go. They are not sure what/which/who to choose.

Practice # 6

PRONOUNS, NUMBERS, PREPOSITIONS