Albert-Ludwigs-University, Freiburg

Wintersemester 2001/02

PS: Early Modern English: Shakespeare’s As You Like It

Syntax of the Verb Phrase
in Shakespeare’s English

by

Nicole Steurer

Contents: 

1. Introduction 3

2. Impersonal verbs and constructions 3
2.1 Impersonal verbs and constructions that have become archaic since Shakespeare’s time 3
2.2 Impersonal verbs and constructions that are not common in their former construction in PDE 4
2.3 Impersonal and personal constructions 6

3. Reflexive verbs 7

4. The sentence type “The book sells well” 8
4.1 Passive, inchoative, reflexive and causative meaning of transitive verbs 9

5. Conclusion 10

Bibliography 11

1. Introduction 

Language is constantly developing. English grammar in the 16th and early 17th century is marked more by the survival of certain forms, constructions and usages that have since disappeared than by any fundamental developments.¹ In this paper I want to demonstrate how the syntax of the verb phrase has changed since Shakespeare’s time.

2. Impersonal verbs and constructions 

Today, former impersonal verbs are more often used personally, with a nominative subject. Some of them have become archaic, others are not common in their former construction in Present Day English. There are several reasons for the preference of the use of personal constructions in Modern English. The most important reasons are the loss of inflections in the Middle English period and limited patterns of word order that resulted from that.² In some cases Shakespeare had already stopped using the old impersonal construction, others mark the change to the use of personal constructions. Shakespeare used for instance both “I like” and “it likes me”, whereas he only used “he list”, but never the impersonal construction “him list”.³

2.1 Impersonal Verbs and constructions that have become archaic since Shakespeare’s time

- it irks me: 

And yet it irks me the poor dappled fools, Being native burghers of this desert city, Should in their own confines with forked heads Have their round haunches gor’d.⁴

- it joys me:

With all my heart, and much it joys me too, To see you are become so penitent.⁵

Other impersonal verbs and constructions that have become archaic since Shakespeare’s time are: “it charges me”, “it dislikes me”, “it faints me”, “it imports me” (= it is of importance to me) and “it yearns me”.⁶

[...]

1 Albert C. Baugh and Thomas Cable, A History of the English Language, p.235

2 ibid, p.162

3 Wilhelm Franz, Die Sprache Shakespeares in Vers und Prosa, p.502

4 William Shakespeare, As You Like It, II1, p. 31

5 William Shakespeare, King Richard III, I2, p. 148

6 Wilhelm Franz, Die Sprache Shakespeares in Vers und Prosa, p.503