Adjectives

Does the sentence below sound nonstandard to you?

Nonstandard

She is the oldest daughter of the two.

When comparing two items, standard written English asks that we use “older” instead of “oldest” even though many of us don’t follow that rule in oral communication.

Standard

She is the older of my two daughters.

“Older” here is an adjective. Adjectives describe nouns. They tell something about people, places, things, and ideas. We use them to answer questions such as what kind, which one, and how many.

In the sentences below, the adjectives are in italics.

I like the blue ship. The boy wore a red sweater. He uses florid prose. We’ve had a bad day. We hope you have a good semester. Live your life by a tremendous philosophy.

In standard edited English, we use the comparative degree of an adjective to compare two things. The comparative degree is created by adding an -er ending to most monosyllabic words, adding the word more to most polysyllabic words, or changing good to better or bad to worse.

Of the two ships, that is the bluer. Which of these two sweaters is the redder? She uses more florid prose than he does. Between yesterday and today, today was worse. Lunch was better than breakfast.

We use the superlative degree of an adjective to compare more than two things. The superlative degree is created by adding an -est ending to most monosyllabic words, adding the word most to most polysyllabic words, or changing good to best or bad to worst.

Of the three ships, that is the bluest. Which of these three sweaters is the reddest? She uses the most florid prose in the entire class. Among yesterday, today, and tomorrow, today was the worst. Dinner was the best of my three meals today.

Confusion sometimes arises in determining when to use more instead of most and when to use better instead of best.

The words more and better are comparative forms; the words most and best are superlative forms. When comparing two things, use more or better; when more than two things are involved, most or best is the word to use. Examine the italicized words in the standard sentences below.

Standard

One woman and one man were out driving. She was the more careful driver, so she was behind the wheel.

Standard

The cook had one croissant, and there were three customers in the restaurant. She had to determine who was the most deserving patron before she could let anyone eat it.

Standard

I was the better of the two guitar players on the night of the final competition.

Standard

I was the best of the three guitar players the night before.

Likewise, worse and worst can easily be misused. Use worse for comparing two things and worst for comparing more than two.

Standard

She tried both pizza places and found that the one on the left was i.

Standard

He ate at seven pizza places; the closest one was also the worst of them all.