On 2010-09-03, at 11:19 PM, Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar wrote:
> I am interested in your analysis of "I hope to improve." If I read your post correctly, you agree that "to improve" is an infinitive phrase functioning as the direct object of the finite verb "hope". You don't want to call it "nominal" though because it couldn't be replaced by a noun? What about a pronoun such as "I hope it"? Pronouns are very "nounish" aren't they?
I would even go further and say that that pronouns are not just nounish; they're full-blown nouns. But I wouldn't analyze 'to improve' as an object in 'I hope to improve' and I find 'I hope it' a pretty questionable construction. But let's grant my example was poorly chosen. What about 'he tends to go', 'decided to go' 'appears to go', 'happened to go' 'she determined to go', or 'they looked to be leaving'?
> It seems to me to be more a matter of what the verb chooses and that there is a distinct class of verbs that force a PP or an infinitive to be the object.
Again, this is a terminological choice. I would prefer to keep 'object' for nouns (NPs) and use 'complement' for PPs, 'to'-infinitives, bare infinitives, 'that'-clauses, etc. One upshot of this choice is that when we have adjectives or nouns followed by 'to'-infinitives (e.g., I had a plan to go), we don't want to be calling 'to go' an object of the noun 'plan'. And yet the relationship between 'plan' and 'to go' is basically the same as it is when 'plan' is a verb. By calling 'to go' a complement, you capture both situations nicely.
A comedy of errors can be amusing, but by definition it's full of misapprehensions. Why needlessly complicate things?
Best,
Brett
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Brett Reynolds
English Language Centre
Humber College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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