A great pleasure or great pleasure?

19 replies
Forums · General English Grammar & Vocabulary, Listening & Speaking · General English Grammar Questions
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  1. It was a great pleasure to send this application for the post of a bus driver.

  1. It was great pleasure to read your advertisement about a bus driver.

    I just want to send an application for the advertised vacancy. I am not sure about the article. Which is the correct one?

Regular Member959
Hello, Rotter, welcome to the English Forums!

1. is correct - with the article-.

You can also say:"I'm glad to send my application ..."/ "I want to apply for..."
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Thanks pienne

Usually the word pleasure is not countable. Is this countable in the given context?
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Hi,

It is a pleasure to meet you - countable, ie use an article.

I read your letter with pleasure - uncountable, no article.

I'd say that in Britain or in N. America, you should just say I am sending (or enclosing) my application ... I would be grateful for an interview.....

In such letters, we don't normally talk about pleasure in this way. It seems excessively polite. It's a feature of our culture, in my opinion.

Best wishes, Clive
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It will be a great pleasure for me if you come. I’m sure you won’t be sorry!

is this correct???
Pleasure is countable in this example, so you should use the "a."

It's not very natural - "it will be a great pleasure" sounds quite formal, but "you won't be sorry" sounds rather informal.
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Anonymousis Is this correct???
Yes. A great pleasure is a single experience of great pleasure. You're only talking about the single experience of the one meeting. You're not talking about all the great pleasure in the world.

CJ
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Clive
It is a pleasure to meet you - countable, ie use an article.

I read your letter with pleasure - uncountable, no article.

Hi

Could you explain why the first one is countable and the second one isn't?
Senior Member4,913
Hi,

It is a pleasure to meet you - countable, ie use an article. It was a pleasure to meet you. And it was a pleasure to see the sun rise today. That's two pleasures.

I read your letter with pleasure - uncountable, no article. Here, the lack of an article indicates that the speaker is thinking of pleasure in a general way, ie 'all the pleasure in the world'. Consider how we are thinking of pleasure when we say something like 'pleasure feels better than pain'.

Could you explain why the first one is countable and the second one isn't?'

Best wishes, Clive
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