Wordie: Postpositive Adjectives: Comments

Comment by reesetee, 8 months ago

Tue, 18 Dec 2007 01:28:17 +0000

You're right, adoarns--realized that after I'd posted. I think my head was loosely attached that day.

Comment by adoarns, 8 months ago

Mon, 17 Dec 2007 23:54:21 +0000

reesetee: the construction you propose doesn't involve post-positive adjectives per se, but rather some syntactic ellipsis: "the best gift possible" → "the best gift that is possible," &c.

And yes, the title has been changed to match standard orthography :-).

Comment by seanahan, 9 months ago

Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:20:32 +0000

Uh, Scotch is Scottish Whisky, which they just call Whisky when you're in Scotland. There is also Whiskey, which is typically Irish, although many places make it now.

Comment by reesetee, 9 months ago

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 13:21:28 +0000

Great list, adoarns! I'd suggest "possible," "imaginable," and "available" (as in "the best gift possible," "worst house imaginable," "quickest route available")--unless you're restricting the list to words that can only be used postpositively.

Not to be nitpicky, but shouldn't it be "postpositive"?

Comment by sionnach, 9 months ago

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 00:12:51 +0000

Cool list. Why do I feel like I need a shot of whiskey?

(And why can I shamefully never remember which is Irish and which is Scotch, without looking it up every single time?)

One might say that adoarns is a listmaker extraordinaire.

Many of the heraldry adjectives (rampant, cabossed, sinister and their many cousins) seem to belong to this category.

Comment by chained_bear, 9 months ago

Sun, 09 Dec 2007 22:20:25 +0000

I always liked the synonymic "since time out of mind" instead of immemorial. Cool list!

Edit: I thought it was spelled "amok," not amuk...?

Comment by adoarns, 9 months ago

Sun, 09 Dec 2007 21:55:42 +0000

Bilby's right; moved to new list on non-"ly" adverbs.

Comment by bilby, 9 months ago

Sun, 09 Dec 2007 21:46:04 +0000

Amuk's originally a verb and functions as an adverb in English. But I like the concept too, a worthy way to trip the list fantastic.

Comment by rolig, 9 months ago

Sun, 09 Dec 2007 21:14:44 +0000

Now here's a list we've needed from time immemorial!