Hello, MrP. Doubtlessly, your first four examples are flawless. With regard to your No. 5 analysis, I am tempted to go a macroscopic way by encompassing more words into the emboldened parts so that the sentence may look like: I prefer to

Just because it takes a subjunctive verb form. There are many other verbs with this nature, but I can't think of any other verb that fits the 'rather than he do it' mold. Could you give me an example for me to sleep on again? Well, how about this?

Hi, Paco. By bestowing the title of professor upon me, you have put me on the faculty. When would you give me students?

I have slept on this issue. It seems to me that the key is the verb 'prefer.' The sentence in question can be rewritten to read: I'd prefer to do it myself rather than (I'd prefer that) Joan do it. When the verb 'prefer' introduces a

Wow, I've learned one more thing about English. Thank you, Paco and CJ. What is missing, though, is an explanation about why the bare infinitive verb is used there. It's rather unusual, isn't it? Can anybody offer your expertise on this?

Hi Miriam. By wh -clauses I meant the clauses using interrogatives. And I would be glad to see some example sentences in which clauses introduced by prepositions are not noun clauses.

You're welcome. You will never go wrong if you memorize by rote that wh -clauses (excluding whether clauses) and preposition-led clauses are all noun clauses.

Here is why, rishonly. Those three verbs used in your examples (know, remember, wonder) are all transitive verbs requiring objects for which nouns are qualified. Therefore, the bracketed parts are noun clauses. With regard to the last example,

Hi, Teo. I agree with Clive. They are all acceptable. What is the grammatical term for the fronted 'clause'? I think this was once discussed here on this forum and I remember there was some controversy over the appellation of it. Some called

Hi, Paco. 'Help' doesn't necessarily take an object. You have probably seen the expression 'Hope this helps' at the end of answers to the questions posted on this forum. Here, it's an intransitive. 'help' is an ergative verb, indeed. Even