Are they absolutely fixed or relatively fixed?

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Believer  #275909  Wed, 04 Oct 06 06:39 AM

Hi,

When I look at some dictionaries, I see phrases like "upon request" and "on request" and one of my dictionaries have many phrases like those in addition to definitions to (I think) help us to get informed of the various usages of words, but sometimes, I wonder if those are fixed and cannot add adjectives to modify.

I think this can be done:

upon generous/popular request

on generous/popopular request

Do you have some suggestions as to help me to make right decisions when confronted with decisions of such nature? How do we know which phrase can be modified with the adjective? Do we just have to watch the normal usages of those phrases and see if they are being used as such?  

  
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Mister Micawber  #276022  Wed, 04 Oct 06 01:59 PM

I am not sure what you are after here, Believer.  Here is what the American Heritage Dictionary has to say about these two synonyms:

"In their uses to indicate spatial relations, on and upon are often interchangeable: It was resting on (or upon) two supports. We saw a finch light on (or upon) a bough. To indicate a relation between two things, however, instead of between an action and an end point, upon cannot always be used: Hand me the book on (not upon) the table. It was the only town on (not upon) the main line. Similarly, upon cannot always be used in place of on when the relation is not spatial: He wrote a book on (not upon) alchemy. She will be here on (not upon) Tuesday."

  
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