What's the logic behind this?/2nd opinions please!

Ah! good thinking!

And if we assume that the board of the workhouse held this opinion too, Dickens' 'concession' can then be classed as ironic.

And perhaps there's another possible reason: perhaps the concession applies rather to 'reckless/desperate'.

Or perhaps there's an element of both reasons.

Well caught! I should have read Dickens more carefully.

Also, it occurs to me that ‘fronting’ of the noun is common in e.g. early alliterative poetry in Germanic languages.

I realize now that this is ambiguous: I should have said 'it occurs to me that ‘fronting’ of the noun is common (e.g. in early English alliterative poetry) in Germanic languages'. (Even then, it doesn't say much.)

So we would have to go a long way back to find evidence of ellipses.

And this is muddled thinking, since, as you point out, by the time we've gone a long way back, we're dealing with quite a different animal.

Another reason people disincline to put "a/an" to the noun in [N as SV] constructs might be that "a/an" cannot be stressed so much in narration.

Yes – in other words, the inversion is no longer quite so 'emphatic'. Cf 'As hungry as he was,...': hardly emphatic at all.

This is my humble opinion and it has no firm grounds.

They sound pretty firm grounds to me.

Thank you, Paco!

MrP

Dear paco,

The indefinite article is optional in your example. Usually it is required as in

He is a loser. - Er ist ein Versager.

I would have to think it over more thoroughly, but for now I would say it is only optional for occupations, professions, cronic medical illnesses and to indicate geographic or ethnic origin (and probably a few other nouns, that describe long term or habitual states, though not all). In all other cases it is required. However, if optional, there are occasions where it sounds slightly odd if you include it and others if you omit it, I am though not sure why and what rule I could give to advise proper usage. Examples:

including is slightly odd (but not wrong!):
He is a professor of fine arts. - Er ist Professor der schoenen Kuenste.

omitting is slightly odd (but not wrong):
He is a politician of the old school. - Er ist ein Politiker des alten Schlages.

both are equal, but omitting is more common:
He is a student. - Er ist (ein) Student.
He is a farmer. - Er ist (ein) Landwirt.
He is a Greek. - Er ist (ein) Grieche.
He is a diabetic. - Er ist (ein) Diabetiker.

required, as neither occupation nor geographic or ethnic origin:
He is a giant. - Er ist ein Riese.
He is an extraterrestrian. - Er ist ein Ausserirdischer.
He is a genius. - Er ist ein Genie.

And you cannot omit it, if there are adjectives or relative clauses:
He is a good professor. - Er ist ein guter Professor.
He is an artist who is famous around the world. - Er ist ein Künstler, der auf der ganzen Welt berühmt ist.

I hope this was interesting although off-topic.

cu

To Eagle

Thank you for the information. I learned some German when young. But now I forget all what I learned. It's a bit sad.

paco


To Komountain

Thank you for the compliment. But please know my opinion is nothing but an opinion. I cannot find any good reference to support it. Let's study it more! By the way I feel you are really a good student of English. Your questions always inspire my mind to study. Also I am admiring your excellent skills of English writing. Have a nice day!

paco

The indefinite article is optional in your example. Usually it is required as in He is a loser. - Er ist ein Versager. I would have to think it over more thoroughly, but for now I would say it is only optional for occupations, professions, cronic medical illnesses and to indicate geographic or ethnic origin (and probably a few other nouns, that describe long term or habitual states, though not all). In all other cases it is required. However, if optional, there are occasions where it sounds slightly odd if you include it and others if you omit it, I am though not sure why and what rule I could give to advise proper usage.

... And I thought English was difficult! Thanks for the warning, Eagle. I may be too old to start studying German.

Since simple words in English are mostly Germanic, and abstractions, technical terms, etc are mostly derived from Latin and Greek, it should (in theory) be true that Latin-derived languages become easier for an English native speaker to learn, as he or she goes further into them, while Germanic ones become more difficult.

I wonder if this is indeed the case.

And is (for instance) English easier for a Spanish person to learn, if he already knows German?

(This is not of course strictly on-piste – but I notice that this thread brings together several people with an interest in German; and MisterM only says he may be too old to start learning, which suggests at the very least a possible interest.)

MrP