"I am well." I hear it hundreds of times a day in response to the question "How are you?" There is an obvious frustration with the fact that this is not the truth* but instead a glossy varnish. But on an entirely different level there is the simple frustration that, despite what your English teacher may have told you, this is not grammatically correct. Let me explain.
English contains two types of verbs: action and stative**. Most verbs are action verbs. As such, we learn the rules of action verbs from a young age: objective case, direct/indirect object, adverb.
Stative verbs walk into the room, urinate on the rules, and set them on fire***. We don't need the objective case because we have the predicate nominative. If you call my cell phone and ask for Jeremy, I (should) say, "I am he." Further, adverbs are replaced by the much belied predicate adjective.
The logic is simple but subtle: predicate adjectives do not actually describe the verb but the subject of the sentence, a noun or pronoun. To say "I am well" is to brag about the quality with which you perform the act of being, a Cartesian grandiloquence par excellence.
Are you really bragging that you exist skillfully? No one is better at that than anyone else, except possibly Chuck Norris or Santa Claus. I'm not trying to tell you how to be. All I'm saying is that if you do well and be good, it will save you a lot of linguistic trouble.
*This morning I was watching several Louis CK videos in which he talked about how good we have it but yet we constantly complain. This evening my friend Katrina mentioned this same thing. In a sense, we shouldn't ever complain. Life is wonderful for all of us.
**Action verbs convey action. Tricky. They are also called dynamic verbs. Stative verbs describe the state of something and are often called linking verbs or verbs of being.
***Stative verbs in action.
"I am well." I hear it hundreds of times a day in response to the question "How are you?" There is an obvious frustration with the fact that this is not the truth* but instead a glossy varnish. But on an entirely different level there is the simple frustration that, despite what your English teacher may have told you, this is not grammatically correct. Let me explain.
English contains two types of verbs: action and stative**. Most verbs are action verbs. As such, we learn the rules of action verbs from a young age: objective case, direct/indirect object, adverb.
Stative verbs walk into the room, urinate on the rules, and set them on fire***. We don't need the objective case because we have the predicate nominative. If you call my cell phone and ask for Jeremy, I (should) say, "I am he." Further, adverbs are replaced by the much belied predicate adjective.
The logic is simple but subtle: predicate adjectives do not actually describe the verb but the subject of the sentence, a noun or pronoun. To say "I am well" is to brag about the quality with which you perform the act of being, a Cartesian grandiloquence par excellence.
Are you really bragging that you exist skillfully? No one is better at that than anyone else, except possibly Chuck Norris or Santa Claus. I'm not trying to tell you how to be. All I'm saying is that if you do well and be good, it will save you a lot of linguistic trouble.
*This morning I was watching several Louis CK videos in which he talked about how good we have it but yet we constantly complain. This evening my friend Katrina mentioned this same thing. In a sense, we shouldn't ever complain. Life is wonderful for all of us.
**Action verbs convey action. Tricky. They are also called dynamic verbs. Stative verbs describe the state of something and are often called linking verbs or verbs of being.
***Stative verbs in action.
That's All Well and Good, or Your English Teacher Lied to You, or A
Good Well? Well Good!
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