Adjective + Pronoun - what kind of sentence structure is that?

Question

I was teaching English to my daughter and stuck up with this structure.

Adjective + pronoun

Say,

Poor him!

She said that there is no preposition between the adjective and pronoun like 'Shame on you.' [sic] This all came when she asked about the latest movie 'Despicable Me.'

Help me to answer her! :)

This may be interesting to you Why do we use the object instead of the subject pronoun in constructions like “stupid me”? and this too Poor 'him' or 'he'? Reason? — SovereignSun, Jul 04 '17 at 10:46
You’re blessed to have such a smart daughter – observant her! — J.R., Jul 04 '17 at 10:50
Actually, it's simply an exclamation expressing sympathy "Poor him!" — SovereignSun, Jul 04 '17 at 12:40

SovereignSun · Answer 1 · 2017-07-04T12:58:05.243

1

It's a phrase that expresses sympathy for the subject (him, her, me, it, they, us, you), it requires third-person concordance. This is done for distancing.

Poor is the adjective that modifies the pronoun (which acts as a noun) that is in the objective case. It's grammatically correct to place adjectives before nouns. Any further pronouns should also have third-person usages:

Stupid me gets himself into trouble again.
Silly me lost her keys again.
His wife found out that he was cheating on her. Poor her!

edited Jul 04 '17 at 12:58

answered Jul 04 '17 at 11:44

SovereignSun

25,028
40
146
271

But in this case (and generally in PDE) the pronoun is not in nominative but in objective case. Note that Kittredge's grammar is Latinate and very old-fashioned, and not reliable for PDE. – StoneyB on hiatus Jul 04 '17 at 12:04
What does PDE stand for? – SovereignSun Jul 04 '17 at 12:13
@SovereignSun Present-Day English. – Mohd Zulkanien Sarbini Jul 04 '17 at 12:16
@StoneyB According to grammar it's in the accusative case (them, him, her, you). – SovereignSun Jul 04 '17 at 12:21
2

@SovereignSun Kittredge seems to be just modern enough (in 1913!) to use 'objective' for Lat 'accusative' and 'dative'. – StoneyB on hiatus Jul 04 '17 at 14:11
2

Note that "Stupid me gets himself" and any other examples where the person appears to change are so awkward for the average speaker that we would usually break it up: "Stupid me! I got myself in trouble again." For the third person this isn't an issue ("Clever John got himself a new car with zero down payment.") – Luke Sawczak Jul 04 '17 at 18:26

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 31 '17 at 11:41

0

"Sentence" is a typographic category, not a grammatical one. This sentence is a noun phrase, not a clause.

answered Jul 31 '17 at 11:41

Brett Reynolds

111
3

Adjective + Pronoun - what kind of sentence structure is that?

2 Answers2