Bird of prey and other “noun of noun” constructions
Subjects formed with multiple nouns connected by of can mean consisting of, or taken from, for example ‘piece of cake’, but can also mean belonging to, or with the purpose of, such as ‘father of the bride’. ‘Bird of prey’ can be confusing, though, because it seems to...Moby Dick Advanced Reading and Prepositions Exercise
Below are the (slightly edited) opening paragraphs of the epic, classic novel Moby-Dick, by Herman Melville. Published in 1851, this story is studied in schools as one of the Great American Novels, and its opening line, “Call me Ishmael” is one of the most famous in...
10 Easily Confused Sets of Words and Phrases Explained
A few weeks ago I wrote an article about the differences between the words plain and plane; it’s one of many articles I have on this site exploring confusing, or easily misunderstood, words and phrases. With so much content on this site, I thought it was time I...
Where are prepositions placed in English sentences?
How can we define the rules for placing a preposition in a sentence? Before a noun? After a verb? One of the additions to the second edition of Word Order in English Sentences is a guide to prepositions. Though they are often connected to other parts of a sentence,...What’s the difference between ‘smile to’ and ‘smile at’?
What is the difference between She smiled at him. and She smiled to him.? Sometimes, there is none. Other times, one might clearly be correct (or incorrect). It’s useful to look at individual examples of preposition use like this with examples and explanations to get...Want to Master English?
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