Grammar By Bas Aarts: Oxford Modern English

That evening, she hosted her nephew, Tom, a successful app developer who spoke in the fragmented, rapid clauses of the digital age. As they sat down to pasta, Tom held up his phone. “So, me and my team…”

“Cover to cover. It’s a noun phrase goldmine. Listen.” He pointed his fork. “You know the ‘split infinitive’? The thing you yelled at me for in 2005? Aarts points out that it’s been used by good writers since the 13th century. ‘To boldly go’ isn’t an error—it’s a style choice .”

“Defective modals!” Tom raised his glass. “The best kind.” oxford modern english grammar by bas aarts

By dessert, she opened her own copy. “He writes that modal verbs are ‘defective’ because they lack non-finite forms,” she said, almost happily.

Dr. Eleanor Marsh, a retired editor whose pulse still quickened at a misplaced apostrophe, had just received two gifts. One was a bottle of expensive Chianti. The other was a brand-new copy of Oxford Modern English Grammar by Bas Aarts. That evening, she hosted her nephew, Tom, a

Eleanor felt the floor of her linguistic universe tilt. She had spent forty years wielding who/whom like a sword. Now Aarts’s book sat on the sideboard, its calm blue cover a quiet rebellion.

She opened the wine first, then the book. “Descriptive, not prescriptive,” she murmured, reading the preface. “Grammar as it is , not as it should be.” She found this both liberating and deeply unsettling. It’s a noun phrase goldmine

Tom nodded, chewing. “Aarts calls it a ‘thematic choice.’ The agent is suppressed because the speaker wants to avoid blame. Not bad grammar—just politics.”