Page 150 - Practical English Usage 3ed - Michael Swan, Oxford

4 very with superlatives
comparison (7): advanced points 141
Note the special use of very to emphasise superlatives and first, next and last. Bring out your very best wine - Michael's coming to dinner.
You're the very first person I've spoken to today.
This is your very last chance.
For modification of (00, see 595.3.
141 comparison (7): advanced points
1 comparative meaning 'relatively', 'more than average'
Comparatives can suggest ideas like 'relatively', 'more than average'. Used like this, comparatives make a less clear and narrow selection than superlatives. Compare:
There are two classes - one for the cleverer students and one for the slower learners.
The cleverest students were two girls from York.
Comparatives are often used in advertising to make things sound less definite.
less expensive clothes for the fuller figure (Compare cheap clothes for fat people)
2 alUanylnone t h e + comparative
All the + comparative suggests the idea of 'even more .. .'.
I feel all the better for that swim.
Her accident made it aU the more important to get home fast.
Any and none can be used in similar structures.
He didn't seem to be any the worse for his experience.
He explained it all carefully, but I was still none the wiser.
Note that this structure is used mainly to express abstract ideas. We would not say, for example, Those pills have made him all the slimmer.
In this structure, the was originally a demonstrative. meaning 'by that'.
3 three times .. .er etc
Instead of three/four etc times as much (see 136.7), we can use three/four etc times + comparative.
She can walk three times faster than you.
It was ten times more difficult than I expected.
Note that twice and halfare not possible in this structure.
She's twice as lively as her sister. (NOT ••• twice livelier . ..)
4 words left out after than
Than often replaces a subject or object pronoun or an adverbial expression, rather like a relative pronoun or adverb (see 581).
She spent more money than was sensible. (NOT ••• them it wtlS 8ertSible.) There were more people than we had expected. (NOT •.. than we hfifJ
expected them.)
I love you more than she does. (NOT ••• than h61t1 much she d6es.)
(In some English dialects, the above sentences would be constructed with than what.)
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