The book was interesting and it was old and it was long and it was a French book too. This is a very odd sentence! ❔ Do you know how it could be improved? In a nutshell (in a few words), we could replace all the ‘and it was’ phrases with commas. So we would […]
I recently rediscovered a book on our shelves that my mother bought when we were children, and which I had been intending to read many times – only beginning now at last! 🗝️ 📗 This book, Charles Kingsley’s The Water Babies (1863), is about a chimney-sweep, that is, a little child who used to sweep
In this second part of our Lesson on adjectives, we are going to focus on adjectives ending with -ing in English (for adjectives ending with -ed, check Part 1 of our Lesson). … 📝 #4 ADJECTIVES ENDING WITH -ing 📘 ‘It seems as if I had been pioneered invisibly, as if some dissolving force had
If you have ever tried to describe someone you know, or an experience you have had, or something that you like, you will have almost certainly used some adjectives. Adjectives in English often end with similar endings – ‘-al’, ‘-ous’, ‘-ful’, ‘-ed’, and ‘-ing’ being some of the most common. In today’s Lesson we are
Comparative adjectives can also work for describing lesser amounts of something. Again, from Gaskell’s Mary Barton: 📗 ‘The friend whom they met was more handsome and less sensible-looking than the man I have just described; he seemed hearty and hopeful, and although his age was greater, yet there was far more of youth’s buoyancy in his appearance.’
Lesson #133: Common Mistakes Made With Comparative Adjectives (Part 2) Read More »
A common error made by English Learners is the INCORRECT DUPLICATION of comparative adjectives. This is partly due to a lack of complete comprehension of the distinctions between the primary types of comparative adjectives. To recap, comparative adjectives are variations of adjectives that describe a larger quantity of that particular thing. For example, the comparative of ‘good’
Lesson #133: Common Mistakes Made With Comparative Adjectives (Part 1) Read More »
The last day of October, Halloween, or ‘All Hallow’s Eve’ as it used to be called! I personally don’t like dark and spooky stories, so to end the month of October, I’m going to share with you something bright and cheerful: a picture of the sun shining on the birch trees at the bottom of
Lesson #131: All Hallow’s Eve Reflections On Autumn, With Scottish Poet James Thomson Read More »
Having read through George Eliot’s Middlemarch passage in the last post, I will share some insights into how she (George Eliot was Mary Ann Evans’ pseudonym) used ADJECTIVES to achieve her purpose. A little bit of background: This passage describes Dorothea Brooke, a young woman who is newly married to a middle-aged scholar. In this passage, she has
Lesson #126: Mini-Lesson Monday (Part 2): Using Influential Adjectives in Written Texts Read More »
Mini-Lesson Monday (Part 1): While admiring these white cyclamens in the pale autumn sunshine, I was reminded of the power of ADJECTIVES in description. Especially when they are suitably chosen! Adjectives are so important for several reasons. # 1 They are valuable in DISTINCTLY DESCRIBING a person, object or event’s ASPECTS. # 2 They can
Lesson #126: Mini-Lesson Monday (Part 1): Using Influential Adjectives in Written Texts Read More »