English Language & Usage Asked by jaws on April 22, 2021
People often say, “that is a nice thing to do!” But when I thought this question over, this thought occurred to me: Why don’t we say ” That is a thing nice to do”?
My reason is as follows. We often say “boys reading under trees,” not “reading boys under trees.” Not that the second one is flawed or anything, but it is just the way it is. Then my question is, why don’t we say “thing nice to do”?
Because "thing" is a (pro)noun and "nice" is an adjective that modifies the noun: Postpositive adjectives are rare in English and their use is generally formulaic; "thing" and "nice" don't meet the criteria.
As for your second paragraph: this is a different situation. "Reading" in the first sentence is a verb - the boys are doing reading; in the second sentence "reading" is an adjective - "reading" is a feature of the boys. If instead we considered it a verb the sentence (as a sentence) would be incomplete - who is reading the boys under the trees?
Answered by Dale M on April 22, 2021
I may be looking at this too simplistically, but it's the same reason we don't say, "she put on her dress red." Nice is an adjective modifying a noun and an adjective comes in front of the noun.
Answered by Grammar Jayne on April 22, 2021
Aren't they different? "that is a nice thing to do!"-> the thing is nice. "that is a thing nice to do" -> doing the thing is nice.
Answered by dlz on April 22, 2021
A Google NGrams comparison thing_INF nice to,nice thing_INF to shows that, at the scale Google chooses, the usage of the forms "thing* nice to" is so rare that it doesn't show on the graph.
Compare instead question_INF hard to,hard question_INF to. Now Google NGrams shows that, though the forms "hard question* to" are used more often, the usage of the forms "question* hard to" at least shows up on the graph.
Perhaps one factor making "thing nice to..." so rare is that the noun "thing" carries very little semantic weight.
Answered by Rosie F on April 22, 2021
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