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За последние 60 дней ни разу не выходила


Открыта: 09-07-2001
Адрес автора: job.lang.edvenglish-owner@subscribe.ru

Автор
Костенко Андрей Владимирович

Статистика

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Продвинутый English


A warm welcome to all subscribers! Здравствуйте, уважаемые подписчики!
Выпуск #137
 "ПРОДВИНУТЫЙ ENGLISH" 19.01.07
Электронный журнал для изучающих английский язык

Dear Friends,
We are very glad to meet you again in our ezine.
We promised you that we would continue discussing English articles.

It's not an easy problem since articles belong to one of the issues which can be talked about almost endlessly, so very often it seems to be rather difficult to find a point of departure. That is where you, subscribers, can give us a hand with your questions and requests.
We got an email from one of you asking us to say something about the correct usage of 'little/few, a little/ a few.'

We would like to note that fulfilling the request of our subscriber this part of our today's issue may be considered just for intermediate students, i.e. "sort of easy", nevertheless we thought it expedient to take a closer look at it here. It hardly will hurt anybody, will it?


If you find the test below too easy for you to be bothered about, just skip the beginning. Further on it certainly will require more brain effort to give the right answer.


TEST
Complete the sentences with (a) few, (a) little, the few, the little, what few or what little giving alternatives where possible.

1. ….. people know (hardly anyone knows) that there is a secret passage from this house to an old smuggler’s cave in the cliffs.
2. ….. (hardly anything) is known about the effect of this drug; yet a chemist will sell it to you without a prescription.
3. I’m having ….. friends in to coffee tomorrow evening. Would you like to come?
4. I have …..money left; let’s have dinner in a restaurant.
5. It’s turned out she knew ….. but enough.

6. ..… belongings she had were packed into a small suitcase.
7. Unfortunately, there was ….. we could do to help him.
8. Simpson is among ….. foreign journalists allowed into the country.

GRAMMAR
1. 'Few' is used with countable nouns in plural, 'little' with uncountables.
We say 'little' and 'few' when we talk about 'not much/not many, not enough'.
To increase the meaning we can say 'very little', 'very few'.

(Very) few people know that there is a secret passage from this house to an old smuggler’s cave in the cliffs.
(Very) little is known about the effect of this drug; yet a chemist will sell it to you without a prescription.
Unfortunately, there was little we could do to help him.
It’s turned out she knew little but enough.

2. 'A little' and 'a few' are more positive and mean 'some, small amount, a small number'.
In informal speech it is possible to use 'a bit' instead of 'a little'.

I’m having a few friends in to coffee tomorrow evening. Would you like to come?
I have a little (a bit) money left; let’s have dinner in a restaurant.

3. 'Only a little' and 'only a few' are a bit tricky and have a negative meaning.

We must be quick. We’ve only got a little time.
The village was very small. There were only a few houses. [1]


4. Quite a few = quite a large number.

I can tell you that quite a few martinis were consumed on the flight back," Nessen added.

5. (a) few and (a) little can also be used with pronouns:

Little is known about her.
'Do you know something about her?' 'A little'.
This information is known by a few.

6. 'The few/the little' followed by a noun means ‘not enough’ when we talk about a group of things or people (with few) or part of a group or amount (with little)

Instead of 'the few/the little' we can use 'what few/little' to mean 'the small number/amount'.

The few/what few belongings she had were packed into a small suitcase.
Simpson is among the few foreign journalists allowed into the country.[1] (a few is also possible) [2]


REFERENCES: [1] English Grammar in Use by Raymond Murphy.
[2] Advanced Grammar in Use by Martin Hewings.



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Автор рассылки Костенко Андрей Владимирович.
Этот выпуск подготовили Любовь Абрамова и Dr.Ortutay Peter.
Special thanks to Artyom Sergeev for proofreading.
Надеeмся, вы нашли эту информацию полезной. Успехов вам!
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