unsolicitedopinion

English grammar continues to confound me. Almost every time I write something, I am faced with strange cases where I cannot decide the grammatical form of a phrase or a sentence. So I resolved to learn grammar all over again, and to share my humbling learning experiences.

Today, when writing a review of the iPhone for the coming issue of Chronicle, one sentence I’ve written read: “There are no lack of reviews on the iPhone everywhere”.

I kept going back to the sentence, thinking “There is” would be more grammatical than “There are”, but wasn’t sure if my verb should follow “lack of” or “reviews”.

I consulted the Longman Dictionary of Grammar & Usage, which was kindly loaned to me by Peng Nam, and searched under the entry “Expletives”:

The word expletive is often used to mean an exclamation or a swear-word. However, as a grammatical term, an expletive refers to it or there being used as a filler, eg

• It is certain that the temperature is too high
• There are many new projects

The entry continues:

When there is used as a false subject, the verb agrees in number with the ‘real’ subject that follows it (ie if the ‘real’ subject is plural, the verb must be plural; if the ‘real’ subject is singular, the verb must be singular), eg:

• There are three hammers in the box.
• There is only one hammer with a broken handle.
• Is there enough water for us to use?
• Were there many doctors on duty?

In my case, it should have been “There is no lack of reviews on the iPhone everywhere”, because the “real” subject here is the “lack of reviews”, just as we’ll write “There is a lack of reviews on the iPhone everywhere” instead of “There are a lack of reviews on the iPhone everywhere”.

After sorting out my thoughts, it does seem embarrassing to be posting something as simple as this, but given that 2,430 other people have made the same mistake as me, I figured I could do with a bit of embarrassment.