Thread: infinitive
View Single Post
  #9 (permalink)  
Old 23-Nov-2003, 02:34
Casiopea's Avatar
Casiopea Casiopea is offline
VIP Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2003
Country: Canada
Posts: 12,997
Current Location: China
First Language: English
Member Type: Other
Thanks: 0
Thanked 60 Times in 57 Posts
Casiopea will become famous soon enough
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by whl626
...the infinitive is supposed to involve ' to ' that is to say 'I am going to write some more posts. ' ... to write .... is the infinitive. Am I right to reason it this way?
Prepositional Phrase
I am going to school. (PP headed by a 'to' preposition)

Verb Phrase
I am going to write. (VP headed by a 'to' infinitive)

I am going + object => to write. (verb)
I am going + object => to school. (noun)

to write and to school are syntactic objects of the verb 'am going'.

Compare:

Gerund
I am going skiing. (object of 'am going')

'to' Infinitive
I am going to ski that hill. (object of 'am going')

Prepositional Phrase
I am going to ski school. (object of 'am going')

:D
Reply With Quote