Tuesday, March 31, 2020

How Non-English Speakers Learn This Crazy Grammar Rule You Know But Never Heard Of


One of the examples isn't actually right.
"As size comes before colour, green great dragons can't exist".

If there is a variety of dragon called "great dragons", which can come in different colours, you would say "green great dragons".




Quartz
Cassie Werber

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That quote comes from a book called The Elements of Eloquence: How to Turn the Perfect English Phrase. Adjectives, writes the author, professional stickler Mark Forsyth, “absolutely have to be in this order: opinion-size-age-shape-colour-origin-material-purpose Noun. So you can have a lovely little old rectangular green French silver whittling knife. But if you mess with that order in the slightest you’ll sound like a maniac.”

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