I am trying, desperately, not to be a prescriptivist, but is this grammatically correct? "such a few leaves?" Shouldn't it be "such few leaves?"

Bob wrote this limerick for OEDILF, and he says that "such a few" is perfectly acceptable. It just doesn't sound right to me:

Bob gave her a quite small bouquet
And she said, to his utter dismay,
"Such a few leaves and flowers
To romance have no powers —
Take your bob back and throw it away."

I did also say that "so few" would be better but is a syllable light for the verse.


Would you have any problem with.

I'll buy a few flowers.

Ack! I sropped reading the OELDIF board because of such arguments, and now they're following me to Wordcraft!

Ignoring the limerick aspect of it Kaleh's question is just, is there anything wrong with the phrase "such a few leaves and flowers"?

"such a few" + plural noun sounds completely wrong to me - why is it OK, Bob?

What sounds worse to me is the perpetaution of the negative stereotype portraying women as ungrateful and materialistic .

because "such a" sounds rightand "a few flowers" sounds right and to me the combination sounds fine.



The best form would be "so few" but there were other reasons for not using that.

And the rest of the limerick cycle portrays the man involved as turning into a complete psycho and murdering her because she rejected him. Hardly a positive stereotype there either.

(He does get caught and hung though - the triumph of law and order.)

The OED Online:

quote:

29 e. such a few, such a many (colloq.): so few, so many.

1841 THACKERAY Gt. Hoggarty Diam. xiii, No one could have thought it could have done such a many things in that time.

Tinman

Interestingly "such a many" sounds odd to me though "such a great many" doesn't.

quote:

Ack! I sropped reading the OELDIF board because of such arguments, and now they're following me to Wordcraft!

When OEDILF was first conceived here on Wordcraft, the understanding was that word and language questions would be discussed on Wordcraft. The project was conceived as a mutual one, and I continue to bring interesting word or language questions to this board. I agree that certain meter or rhyming questions can often be tedious and not all that interesting, though sometimes even those questions can create interesting pronunciation discussions.

I actually wish that we on Wordcraft received more of their word or language questions. Often their members don't think about us.

I thought perhaps it was a UK/US difference, but Cat doesn't seem to like it, either. Tinman, I am not surprised that it was used that way in the 1800s; I just think it sounds strange today.

Here was one revision that someone suggested:

"So few blossoms or flowers" I'd go for something similar to that.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kalleh,