such...as / such...like

suchlike him would be fine, IMO.
I have not met anybody ugly suchlike him
"Never in my life have I met such an ugly man as him. OK

"Suchlike" cannot be used as a preposition; it's either a determiner or a pronoun, I'm afraid...

I wouldn't be using suchlike here:
-----
suchlike


Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from ¹such + like

: of like kind : SIMILAR<a locker which normally held stationery, ink, and suchlik

Inchoateknowledgesuchlike him would be fine, IMO.
I have not met anybody ugly suchlike him
"Never in my life have I met such an ugly man as him. OK

Incorrect. Use it this way:

A locker that usually contained paper, ink, and suchlike equipment"

That pos

Yet I don't like the structure "such a ... as"

I'd write either "such an ugly man" or "a man as ugly as he".

What do the natives think?

Pieanne, I agree with you completely. It has a literay sense, and it may be just right for something you are writing, but if you are having a conversation, I would use what you have said. (Well, I hope I wouldn't. It's rather impolite! But grammatically, I would.)

(Except that it's becoming more common to hear "...a man as ugly as him" even though it's incorrect.)

Thanks, GG!

I know about the "... as him" thing, but since we're on a grammar forum ... I didn't use it.

We are probably the last defenders of things like the subjunctive "if I were" and "more than she [is]" here. To arms, to arms!

Cheers, GG! [D] [D]