Phrasal Verb vs Intransitive + Preposition

Question

Hello,

I was wondering about conception of "Phrasal verb & Instransitive plus Preposition" :

Examples : Breakfast consisted of dry bread and a cup of tea.

He graduated from the high school.

"Consist of" is called Prasal verb and "graduate from" is composed of Intransitive plus preposition.

What is the difference between the two , in grammatical usages?

TasmanTiger

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

Dear TasmanTiger

Your question is quite difficult, but I will try..

I have used these abbreviations..

AP = Adverbial Phrase
IP = Intransitive Verb plus Preposition

Instead of your examples, may I use?..

- He walked to his school
- He made up his story

In grammatical structure, these look the same but they are different - and this, I think, is the

point of your question. In the first sentence, the preposition "to" belongs to "his school". In the

second, the preposition "up" belongs to "made"..

He walked / to his school

He made up / his story

This is because the verb "made up" is a creative use of English. It starts with the verb "to make" -

meaning just "to make (something)"; but "to make up (something)" means to invent something for fun,

or to deceive someone

This makes a difference in grammar - below are a few ideas. There is no easy rule, but I would say: in IP, the preposition must stay before the noun

With a pronoun in IP, the pronoun will come at the end; but it is the opposite with AP..

How did he get to the school?
- He walked to it

What sort of story did he tell?
- He made it up

In passive speech, AP will often work; but with IP it will not..

His story was made up

[But definitely not] His school was walked to [Do not say!]

When phrases are moved around in a literary way, the IP must keep the preposition before the

noun; but AP sends it to the end..

And so it was: to the school he must walk

And so it was: he must make the story up

Your original example, along the lines of: "My breakfast consisted of tea and toast" is a good example of IP, but is diffficult to explain because most uses of consist (apart from yours) are old. However..

As a final example (but with English too old to use now), here is how Shakespeare changes the word order with "consist" - he leaves the preposition in front of the noun (Pericles, I, iv). It means - roughly - I am happy with the idea of peace, if he can live with it..

Welcome is peace if he on peace consist;..

Hope this may help, Dave

Anonymous · Answer

Dear TasmanTiger

I have just realised I said "Adverbial Phrase" in that post to you

I meant "Phrasal Verb", just as you said it

Sorry to be confusing

Dave

CalifJim · Answer

TasmanTigerWhat is the difference between the two

See for Radford's list of tests you can apply to decide between one and the other.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

Hopefully, I can explain this to you simply.

A phrasal verb consists of verbs plus an essential preposition that cannot be separated.

"Breakfast consisted dry bread and a cup of tea." "Breakfast consisted." These sentences don't make sense without the preposition "of." Can you see that?

"He graduated high school in 1963." This sentence makes sense without a preposition.

That's the difference between phrasal verbs and simple verbs followed by a preposition.

Ok?

Anonymous · Answer

Thank you so much , Dave

Your explanations are impressive and to the opint.

They are helpful to get to understand the ideas of verb usage.

Belongs , Inversion and With pronoun are all good !

Appreciate it all,

TT

Phrasal Verb vs Intransitive + Preposition

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