# Four grammatical errors in a three-word sentence? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 22, 2011, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797 "2011-11-22T21:18:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![brianmelendez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/65b543/32.png) [@brianmelendez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brianmelendez)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/1 "2011-11-22T21:18:18Z")
A Facebook friend posted that she was reading > [@](#): > > a wonderful 2005 remembrance of Eleanor Gould from The New Yorker and wondering what a three-word sentence with four grammatical errors might look like. “Miss Gould once found what she believed were four grammatical errors in a three-word sentence. And yet the sentence, by Lawrence Weschler (and, alas, no longer remembered), was published as written.” Is the quadruply erroneous three-word sentence really “no longer remembered”? In the alternative, can anyone offer an example of a three-word sentence with four grammatical errors? (Errors in spelling or usage don’t count, only grammatical errors.) ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/2 "2011-11-22T21:35:10Z")
Hmm. You can do it in a language that has plurality in adjectives with something like \ \<3rd person plural adjective\> \<2nd person singular verb\> The closest I can get in English is something like “Him slow eat”, as intended to mean “He slowly eats”. The rules broken are 1. Incorrect use of objective pronoun instead of subjective one (“him” instead of “he”) 2. Verb agreement (singular object, plural verb) 3. Incorrect use of adjective instead of adverb (“slow” instead of “slowly”) 4. Adjective/adverb agreement (This has no standard English analog, but in, say, Spanish, there are plural and singular adjectives). I based this on the first thing that came up in a Google search for [Grammatical rules](http://www.grammarbook.com/english_rules.asp). Hopefully that’ll get us started. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/3 "2011-11-22T21:37:55Z")
Would a punctuation error count as one of them? Him slow eat’s. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/4 "2011-11-22T21:39:05Z")
“I feels good”; ---
**Author:** ![PacifistPorcupine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@PacifistPorcupine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PacifistPorcupine)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/5 "2011-11-22T21:53:17Z")
They’s feels gooder ---
**Author:** ![Cyningablod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc29f/32.png) [@Cyningablod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyningablod)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/6 "2011-11-22T21:58:31Z")
“No longer remembered” isn’t a sentence. It’s a sentence fragment. As for a three-word sentence with four grammatical errors: _Él coman ningún._\* You didn’t say the sentence had to be English. 😃 * * * \*There are four errors here, assuming one means to say, _Él no come ninguno_ (“He eats none” / “He doesn’t eat any at all”): 1. The verb _comer_ is conjugated in the wrong number (3p pl vs 3p sing). 2. The verb _comer_ is in the wrong mood (subjunctive vs indicative). 3. The negative particle _no_ is missing. 4. The word _ningún_ is in the wrong form; it should appear in its pronoun form (_ninguno_) rather than its apocopated adjective form. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/7 "2011-11-22T22:05:14Z")
Maybe if someone accidentally typed “see Spot run.”, when what they had intended to type was “When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/8 "2011-11-22T22:07:45Z")
Neither the site I first looked at nor [Wikipedia on English grammar](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammar) considers punctuation to be part of grammar. Ok, I think I’ve gotten there in English with [Ditransitive verbs](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ditransitive_verb), which are verbs that take two objects. The sentence “Them puts myself” has two incorrect pronouns, verb disagreement between the object and verb, and “put” is a verb that requires two objects “He put it there”. I don’t think the “gooder” sentence qualifies, since “gooder” isn’t a word, so you can’t really reason about what grammatical rules might apply. If that one qualifies, then so does that sentence with any non-word string of characters as the last word. ---
**Author:** ![Fiendish\_Astronaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiendish_astronaut/32/3295_2.png) [@Fiendish\_Astronaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiendish_Astronaut)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/9 "2011-11-22T22:10:22Z")
nm (apologies) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/10 "2011-11-22T22:23:13Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > Neither the site I first looked at nor [Wikipedia on English grammar](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammar) considers punctuation to be part of grammar. Wikipedia lists the stuff under [Common grammatical errors](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Common_grammatical_errors). ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/11 "2011-11-22T23:13:07Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > The sentence “Them puts myself” has two incorrect pronouns, verb disagreement between the object and verb, and “put” is a verb that requires two objects “He put it there”. “Put” doesn’t require two objects and doesn’t have two in your sentence. “There” is an adverb in your sentence. “Gave” is a ditransitive verb as in “I gave Jim the book.” “Book” is the direct object and Jim is the indirect object. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2011, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/12 "2011-11-22T23:34:58Z")
> [@OldGuy](#): > > “Put” doesn’t require two objects and doesn’t have two in your sentence. “There” is an adverb in your sentence. “Gave” is a ditransitive verb as in “I gave Jim the book.” “Book” is the direct object and Jim is the indirect object. So it does. I think it still works for the OP, though. “Put” requires an object and a locative adverb, and there isn’t one? I tried to make a broken sentence using the ditransitive verbs listed, but they all seem to work with an implied object. “I gave the book” seems like it works in context. ---
**Author:** ![sundog66](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/13 "2011-11-23T00:05:27Z")
Four errors? Pfft, I can do better than that: Him myself give. 1. “Him” should be “he”. 2. “myself” should be “me”. 3. “give” should be “gives” or “gave”. 4. “give” requires one additional object. 5. “give” should be immediately after the subject. An myself give. 6. “An” should be “A” (since the next word begins with a consonant) . 7. “A(n)” needs a noun to go with it. 8. “myself” should be “me”. 9. “give” should be “gives” or “gave”. 10. “give” requires one additional object. 11. “give” should be immediately after the subject. An an give. 12. “An” (first instance) should be “A” (since the next word begins with a consonant) . 13. “an”(second instance) should be “a” (since the next word begins with a consonant) . 14. “A(n)” (first instance) needs a noun to go with it. 15. “a(n)” (second instance) needs a noun to go with it. 16. “give” should be “gives” or “gave”. 17. “give” requires one additional object. 18. “give” should be immediately after the subject. The key to getting seven errors in a three-word sentence is: (a) Each word should be in the wrong form (3 errors). (b) Each word should fail to satisfy its distributional requirements (3 more errors). © The word order should be wrong (1 error). Now I challenge anyone to get eight errors in a three-word sentence! (Not necessarily saying it can’t be done, especially if you fiddle around with how word order errors are counted so that you could get more than one…) ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/14 "2011-11-23T00:09:46Z")
I can’t come up with a good one right now, but you could use a sentence that requires an article before the noun. Something like “Me puts book.” ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/15 "2011-11-23T00:14:03Z")
> [@sundog66](#): > > Four errors? Pfft, I can do better than that: > > Him myself give.[…] > An myself give.[…] > An an give. > > 1. “An” (first instance) should be “A” (since the next word begins with a consonant) . > […] #1 in your last example is wrong, as an starts with a vowel. Perhaps use the fact that there is no subject to the sentence. Plus there’s the problem that all of your statements could arguably be argued not to be sentences. I’d personally grant the first one, but not the rest. ---
**Author:** ![sundog66](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/16 "2011-11-23T00:18:38Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > #1 in your last example is wrong, as an starts with a vowel. Perhaps use the fact that there is no subject to the sentence. Ah, good catch! It should of course have been: A an give. > [@](#): > > Plus there’s the problem that all of your statements could arguably be argued not to be sentences. I’d personally grant the first one, but not the rest. That’s circular reasoning: the reason they’re not sentences is because they’re ungrammatical. Of course, the more errors they contain, the less they “seem” like sentences. ---
**Author:** ![Cayuga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Cayuga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cayuga)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/17 "2011-11-23T00:25:39Z")
This is fun and all, but the sentence Miss Gould found was in the manuscript of a story for The New Yorker – and was, in fact, printed in the magazine without correction – so it’s unlikely to have sounded like something a Horta would burn into a rock. ---
**Author:** ![sundog66](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/18 "2011-11-23T00:53:27Z")
> [@Cayuga](#): > > This is fun and all, but the sentence Miss Gould found was in the manuscript of a story for The New Yorker – and was, in fact, printed in the magazine without correction – so it’s unlikely to have sounded like something a Horta would burn into a rock. Yes, I don’t mean to suggest that such a fine publication as the New Yorker would publish a sentence like “Him give myself”, let alone “A an give.” I think it’s highly likely that either (a) the story is apocryphal or (b) the four errors in question included errors of spelling and/or punctuation. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/19 "2011-11-23T18:10:57Z")
> [@sundog66](#): > > 1. “give” requires one additional object. One thing that I noticed while I was thinking of sentences is that grammatical errors can’t always be confined to or determined by a single sentence. If person A is talking with person B about gifts A and C had given to D: “We gave him a book and ten million dollars.”, then person C says “I gave the book”, that would be a perfectly grammatical sentence. The verb “gave” requires a second object, but the object is implied by the previous sentence, so the sentence that doesn’t explicitly mention it isn’t ungrammatical in context. The thing I like about “put” is that I can’t think of a context in which the locative adverb could be implied. Although, now that I’ve said that, I fully expect someone to come up with one. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2011, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797/20 "2011-11-23T18:56:24Z")
> [@iamthewalrus\_3](#): > > The thing I like about “put” is that I can’t think of a context in which the locative adverb could be implied. Although, now that I’ve said that, I fully expect someone to come up with one. “I put the shot.” [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/four-grammatical-errors-in-a-three-word-sentence/603797.md?page=2)