[Grammar] Impressed of

[Anne59]

Hi everyone,

My grammar book says I can use "impressed by", "impressed with" and "impressed of" but my English friend has never heard of "impressed of". Has anyone heard of it? I can't find it on the Internet either so I'm beginning to think it is a mistake.

Thanks!

 

[Roman55]

I am not a teacher.

You can use 'impressed on' too, but I think 'impressed of' is a mistake. If it exists, and I have certainly never used it, I would expect to be told that it is archaic.

 

[Tdol]

I've never used it either.

 

[BobK]

I haven't used it either, but I can imagine someone trying to change the passive focus of the bi-<thingummy> verb in 'it was impressed on him' as 'he was impressed of it' -?) - on the analogy of 'he was apprised of it'.

(Sorry - word escapes me. Age ;-))

b

 

[Tarheel]

Can you give me a sample sentence using impressed of? (I have neither heard it used nor used it myself.)

 

[BobK]

The word I was looking for yesterday was ditransitive. And I didn't say it (this particular usage) was OK.

What I did say was that with a ditransitive verb there are two possible focuses for a passive. So there might, sometimes, be a temptation to say both

'The importance of X was impressed on him' tick

and

'He was impressed of the importance of X.' -?) I wouldn't use it, but I can imagine a situation where someone might try it! - especially if they had in mind a model like 'He was apprised of the importance of X.' tick

(NB: This sort of 'impress' has nothing to do with being awestruck.)

b

 

[Tdol]

The BNC lists examples of impressed by/with/on/upon/at/in/as/for/despite/after/against/without/like/into/from/above. The ones towards the end are single examples, against 748 for impressed by. COCA has one example of impressed of, and it doesn't count: Most impressed of all was Alistair.... So, while it may be possible, it remains extremely unlikely,so it's odd for a grammar book to give it as a real possibility.

 

[BobK]

Agreed. And I think I abused ditransitive back there. I think real ditransitive verbs are ones like read and give: 'Read it me', 'Give it him'... - verbs that take two objects (one of which is 'dative' [in old money ;-)]) without intervening prepositions.

b