My Writing Notebook » Adjectives

Note 128 – Hyphenating adjectives correctly

Sandra Madeira — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 21:32:10 +0000

There are many adjectives with hyphens such as left-handed and well-mannered; however, in some instances you don’t need a hyphen. The Pocket Writer’s Handbook by Martin Manser & Stephen Curtis suggests using a hyphen if the adjective comes before a noun e.g. a left-handed child and a well-kept house. If, however, the adjective follows a verb then it doesn’t require a hyphen e.g. Masie is left handed and Suzie likes well behaved children.

More examples:

The self-help books are upstairs.
Adam is self conscious.
Jane is a well-known writer.
The soup is home made.
Home-made soup is delicious.

Is the following correct?

“The department store sells left-handed cutlery”

I couldn’t find anything suggesting what to do if the adjective follows a verb and is also before a noun, so I turned to the Oxford A-Z of Grammar & Punctuation by John Seely. He suggests that a compound adjective (a word composed of two words – in this case left-handed) should have a hyphen if it makes the meaning clearer. In the above sentence, I believe that it reads better when the word ‘left-handed’ has a hyphen.

That’s it for today. If you have any questions about today’s blog, please leave me a comment.

Don’t forget that you can subscribe to receive my daily blogs by email so that you don’t miss any. Just click ‘sign me up’ on the home page. Alternatively you can follow my blogs on Twitter http://twitter.com/#!/madeirasandra or my new Tips and Luxuries Facebook page. Requests for future blogs (punctuation/grammar/writing tips) are always welcome.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

My writing challenge: http://wp.me/p1x6Ui-4

This blog: http://mywritingnotebook.wordpress.com

My other blog: http://sandramadeira.wordpress.com

My website: www.tipsandluxuries.com (includes the introduction to my upcoming book ‘A Gift for Stressed and Busy Parents’)

Twitter: @madeirasandra and @tipsandluxuries

Reference list:

Pocket Writer’s Handbook by Martin Manser & Stephen Curtis (Penguin Reference Library)

The Oxford A-Z of Grammar & Punctuation by John Seely, USA

Note 93 – Comparative and superlative adjectives

Sandra Madeira — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 23:20:07 +0000

“One of the most valuable services that adjectives provide is a range of comparisons” writes Graham King in his book Collins Improve your Grammar. According to John Seely in The Oxford A-Z of Grammar & Punctuation, many adjectives have three forms. They are:

Absolute e.g. large (base adjective)
Comparative e.g. larger (used when comparing two items)
Superlative e.g. largest (used when comparing more than two items)

Rules for the superlative form

The superlative form of the adjective can cause some confusion, as the rules are different depending on how many syllables the base adjective has. This is explained below.

What is the superlative if base adjective has one syllable?

If the absolute form or the base adjective has one syllable, then the superlative is formed by placing the letters ‘-est’ after it (unless it ends in ‘e’, which means you would add ‘-st’).

White, whiter, whitest
Full, fuller, fullest
Cool, cooler, coolest

What is the superlative if the base adjective has three or more syllables?

Seely explains that if the base adjective has three or more syllables, then the superlative is formed by placing the word ‘most’ in front of the base adjective.

Comfortable, more confortable, most comfortable
Beautiful, more beautiful, most beautiful

Other intensifying words can be used here as well, such as least i.e. least comfortable, least beautiful.

What is the superlative if the base adjective has two syllables?

This is where it can get confusing as the superlative can be formed by either adding ‘-est’ after the base adjective or putting the word ‘most’ in front of the base adjective.

Seely explains that for certain adjectives with two syllables, you can use either form e.g. clever could be cleverest or most clever.

Are there exceptions?

Like most things, there are exceptions e.g. Graham King, in his book Collins Improve your Grammar, explains that you wouldn’t get away with saying unkinder for the base adjective unkind. He does, however, add that the phrase ‘unkindest cut of all’ survives from the 16^th century.

To add to the confusion

Sometimes there is no comparative or superlative at all. An example given in John Seely’s book The Oxford A-Z of Grammar & Punctuation is the word annual e.g. the annual festival.

My thoughts: Before today, I didn’t know that (in most cases) you can work out whether to use ‘-est’ or ‘most’ for the superlative form of the adjective. I remember learning the correct forms parrot fashion at school. How do you remember which form to use?

Hope you’ve enjoyed today’s blog.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

This blog: http://mywritingnotebook.wordpress.com

My other blog: http://sandramadeira.wordpress.com

My website: www.tipsandluxuries.com (includes the introduction to my book ‘A Gift for Stressed and Busy Parents’)

Twitter: @madeirasandra and @tipsandluxuries

Reference list:

John Seely The Oxford A-Z of Grammar & Punctuation, USA

Graham King The Collins Improve your Grammar, UK

Note 64 – Ambiguity with adjectives and commas

Sandra Madeira — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 21:53:01 +0000

For the background to my writing challenge, please read my first blog by clicking the following link – http://wp.me/p1x6Ui-4. If you would prefer to dive straight into note 64, then please read on…

Adjectives and commas

According to Graham King in his book Collins Improve Your Punctuation, if the adjectives in your sentence “define separate attributes” e.g. abrupt, rude, opinionated, then you would separate them by a comma. On the other hand you wouldn’t separate them with a comma if the adjectives “work together to create a single image” e.g. large concrete shed. Some examples are below:

My next door neighbour is a tall, clever and rich person (these are all separate attributes, so the first two are split by commas)
There is a brown African drum in my living room (these adjective work together more, so no comma is required)

Tips from the experts

As this seems a little ambiguous, I’ve included a few tips from the experts:

The book Collins Improve Your Punctuation explains that “One way to deal with the ambiguity problem is to imagine an and between the adjectives; if an and can be inserted and still makes sense, then a comma can normally be subsituted.”
Bernard C. Lamb in his book The Queen’s English says “if you employ a series of adjectives, use commas between adjectives where the sense is and”.

Quick test

Which of the following sentences do you think should have commas separating the adjectives (shown in bold)?

Q1. In our garden there is a large concrete shed

Q2. There is a small blue van outside our house

Q3. The girl had soft brown hair

Q4. There are a lot of bees in our pretty tidy garden

As usual, the answers can be found at the end of this blog.

Please feel free to comment on this blog if you wish and don’t forget to send me any requests (relating to writing/English) that you would like me to blog about. Hope you have enjoyed your weekend.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra

This blog: http://mywritingnotebook.wordpress.com

My other blog: http://sandramadeira.wordpress.com

My website: www.tipsandluxuries.com (includes first chapter of my book)

Twitter: @madeirasandra and @tipsandluxuries

Reference list:

Graham King The Collins Improve your Punctuation, UK

Bernard C. Lamb The Queen’s English (2010), UK

Answers:

For Q1, 2 and 3, the adjective appear to work together so I wouldn’t separate them with commas.

For Q4, this sentence could have two meanings a ‘pretty tidy’ garden (fairly tidy garden) or a pretty, tidy garden (pretty and tidy garden). It would therefore require a comma if the garden was pretty and tidy, as these are two separate attributes.