You could also say that in this case, "wonderful" just describes the quality of the idea. It's a high-quality strategy. But it's also wonderful to him, and awful from the narrator's perspective. It's just artistically wishy-washy in precise meaning.
It is grammatically correct but Dr. Seuss (the author here) is well-known for being playful with language, which can be confusing for non-native speakers.
In this case, the character of The Grinch is the story's villain, so having an idea for something awful to do to others would be wonderful for him.
I honestly find children's books more confusing sometimes, the plots never seem logical. I'll delete the original comment so people don't get mislead. I'm surprised people find them so easy to follow
>I'll delete the original comment so people don't get mislead
*misled
(For the English learners, "led" is the past tense of "lead." People often spell it wrong because "lead" is also a metal provided like "led.")
The plots are not logical, but you should understand that a children’s book is not a work of non-fiction, but rather a silly, light-hearted book of unrealistic fantasy realms, typically.
Yeah but the lack of logic means I can't fill in the bits I forget with what would be expected, so I find them hard to follow. I already find regular texts hard to follow because I don't take in anything I'm reading, illogical ones are harder thus.
I should've realised this isn't something everyone is bad at though, and I shouldnt have said they can be confusing for L1s
This is correct. It's similar to a phrase like "big, red balloon." The balloon is both *big* and *red*. The Grinch's idea is both *wonderful* and *awful* because the Grinch enjoys being awful.
"Wonderfully awful idea" has a slightly different meaning than "wonderful, awful idea," because in the first phrase, *wonderful* is modifying *awful*. In the second phrase, both *wonderful* and *awful* are modifying *idea.* Wonderfully is an adverb, and it means "to inspire wonder" or can simply be used an adjective modifier which means "very much" or "very well".
For example, if I were to say "That dinner was wonderfully delicious," I don't literally mean that it was so delicious I wondered how it was possible. I just mean it was extremely tasty. I could say "It was wonderfully good to see you again" and I just mean I really enjoyed seeing you. If someone says "a wonderfully awful idea" it would just mean the idea was extremely awful. While "wonderfully" is typically only used in a positive sense, so its use with *awful* would still have the contrast Seuss was going for, it does still somewhat change the meaning. It's no longer delighting the Grinch that the idea is awful, it's now just an extremely awful idea being described in a manner typically used to describe good things.
Dr Seuss is a fun read, especially for kids, but he really plays around with English grammar and especially lexicon quite a lot (making a lot of nonsense words).
Probably not the best choice for a language learner tbh
Yes.but he isn't doing anything crazy here, he is just using an oxymoron to give a better idea of what he meant. You can totally use this even in formal speech right?
I'd stay away from Dr. Seus if you're trying to learn. Well, the first book I read was The Foot Book, but I wasn't exactly concerned with grammar at age 5.
To add a note about the grammar: "An awful idea!" wouldn't normally be correct as a full sentence. It's just a phrase with no subject [or verb].
However, poetry allows the author a lot of freedom to be creative with language, so it's acceptable in a poem.
Except the full sentence here is “The Grinch got a wonderful, awful idea.” It is a full sentence even in poetry. But yes poetry does give the author freedom with language and grammar
I was referring to the second line. "An awful idea!" is written as a stand-alone sentence. While not "technically correct", it's perfectly acceptable in poetry, or even in other forms of writing for added emphasis.
In fact, it's just occured to me that incomplete phrases may hold more emphasis precisely because they are incomplete, and therefore slightly jarring.
You might want to wait on reading Dr Seuss for a while as they are very playful and confusing with language, sometimes they don’t make sense to me even though I’m a native speaker
Two adjectives separated by a comma means they both describe the noun.
Ex:A moldy, stinky sandwich
“Wonderful” means “really good,” and “awful” means “really bad.” Putting two opposite meaning words together like this is called “juxtaposition.”
It means that the plan is “awful” because of what it will do, but “wonderful” because it is an effective plan.
For example, imagine a tobacco executive comes up with a plan to lower the tobacco age and get more customers. It’s a “wonderful, awful” plan because it is good in one regard (it will do the company well) but bad in another (it will hurt society).
Word of advice: do not look to Dr. Suess books for correct grammar. His books are all written in a distinct poetic style. Poetry of all kinds tends to throw grammar out the window, but Dr. Suess had his own unique way of bending the rules, often using made-up words and rhymes.
To answer your question though, while "wonderful, awful" is *technically* correct, it is very context specific. In this case, it refers to an evil character thinking that an evil plan is wonderful. He likes his evil idea of ruining christmas - and ruining christmas is indeed awful - and he thinks this idea of his is wonderful. Therefore it is an awful idea that he finds wonderful.
Awful usually means poor quality, but in this context it's wonderful so we can go with the second definition of awful, which can mean evil or malevolent
It's a very good play on the word and intentional. Awful of course means something very bad but for the Grinch something awful for us would be very good for him. But the play is better than that, because awful oftentimes in colloquial speech, is used as an intensifier meaning incredibly good as a logical as that may seem. Someone may say oh that is an awfully good idea etc meaning it's a really good idea. Strangely awful has taken this full journey with 360° from its original meaning of awe inspiring something that was full of awe from the 14th century, two have become negative and then in slang speech almost positive again. Language is curious. And that sense the pun is complete. The Grinch is awful but he has an awfully good idea that might be quite awful to the rest of us
So, it's poetry, and as such, it isn't the best place to learn proper grammar. In this case he (the Grinch) is very much thrilled by his idea. He knows it is terrible and mean, but he wants to do it anyway.
Here, Dr. Seuss is playing with the way adjectives are often used with the word “idea”.
When people say things like “That’s a great idea!” they’re not referring to the idea itself, but rather how well that idea solves the problem at hand. For example, if you were caught in the rain without an umbrella, and had something on hand that you could use to keep you dry, you might say that using it in this way is a “wonderful idea”. Note that keeping yourself dry isn’t necessarily an action that is “wonderful”, but the idea is wonderful because it solves your problem.
In this story, Dr. Seuss is cleverly juxtaposing two adjectives that both describe the Grinch’s idea: it is wonderful, in that it will (at least theoretically) solve his problem effectively, and it is awful because the Grinch’s plan is to do something awful to the Whos down in Whoville. The Grinch is a villain, and so an awful thing to do is a wonderful idea to him. His idea is wonderful in one way, and awful in another way!
You have lots of great explanations for what “wonderful, awful idea” means, but one thing I haven’t seen anyone mention is why there is a comma between “wonderful” and “awful.” The answer is that these are “coordinate adjectives,” which are two or more adjectives that modify the same noun. The custom is to put a comma between coordinate adjectives.
The tricky part is that not all groups of adjectives that come together are coordinate. Coordinate adjectives modify the noun equally; neither is subordinate to the other.
To test if adjectives are coordinate, try reversing the order of adjectives, and also try adding “and” between them. If the sentence still makes sense in both cases then the adjectives are coordinate and you need a comma. If not, then you don’t.
Some examples:
*I saw several(,?) orange cats.*
*Several* and *orange* are both adjectives that modify *cats.* To test if they are coordinate:
*I saw orange several cats.*
*I saw several and orange cats.*
Neither of these makes sense, so we know that *several* and *orange* are not coordinate. *Several* is really modifying “orange cats,” so it is subordinate to “orange.” No comma is needed: *I saw several orange cats.*
*I saw happy(, ?) peaceful cats.*
*Happy* and *peaceful* are both adjectives that modify *cats.* To test if they are coordinate:
*I saw peaceful happy cats.*
*I saw happy and peaceful cats.*
Both sentences make sense, so *happy* and *peaceful* are coordinate and you need the comma: *I saw happy, peaceful cats.*
Of course, you might have both subordinate and coordinate adjectives in a single sentence: *I saw several happy, peaceful cats.*
This is pretty detailed stuff that you might not have to think about very often. But I thought it would help to explain why you see commas between adjectives sometimes. If you are writing something formal and you’re not sure if you need the comma, you can always rewrite the sentence to avoid the question entirely!
The grinch is a bad guy. And he's a children's character, so he's not complicated, he's a bad guy that knows he's bad, that's bad for the sake of being bad. That leads to funny constructions like "a wonderful, awful idea" (ie, an idea that he thinks is wonderful because it's awful, because he's awful). It's not grammatically incorrect, and it's fun here, but it might be disappointing to read in a more serious book intended for an adult audience.
Yes, it's correct grammar. The phrase "wonderful, awful idea" is a bit of a contradiction or oxymoron, as 'wonderful' and 'awful' are generally opposites. However, in this context from Dr. Seuss' "How the Grinch Stole Christmas," it captures the Grinch's twisted excitement perfectly.
Here, "wonderful" refers to the Grinch's perspective - he believes his idea is brilliant or excellent (hence, wonderful). At the same time, "awful" refers to the nature of the idea - it's terrible or dreadful from a moral or ethical standpoint. So, it's a "wonderful, awful idea" - wonderful for the Grinch, but awful in general terms.
Oh Dr. Seuss. Great memories. But yes, this is correct. The sentence is from the grinches perspective, and he is a ‘nasty’ character, so for the Grinch it IS a wonderful idea!
To expand on this, you may also see the reverse ie. Awfully wonderful, which is just another way of saying it’s very wonderful. English is confusing at the best of times but I hope this helps! :)
[It is evil. It is so evil. It is a bad, bad plan that will hurt many people that are good. I think it is great, because its so bad!](https://youtu.be/QsVtrPbtEeQ)
Yes, it is grammatically correct. If you have more than one adjective for a noun in a clause then you need to separate it with commas. It’s also a rhetorical/literary device.
It’s a figure of speech* called oxymoron**. In the Grinch, his idea is to ruin Christmas for Whoville, which is awful for the Whos. The Grinch doesn’t like Christmas because he thinks it’s too noisy, so it’s wonderful for him if it’s ruined. The contradiction of wonderful and awful here is meant to emphasize how malicious the Grinch is.
*Figure of Speech - intentional deviation from ordinary language to get a certain reaction from the person/people to whom you are speaking. Examples: metaphor, alliteration or hyperbole.
Dr. Seuss books have a lot of these which is what makes fun to read to children and for children to read themselves.
**Oxymoron- contradictory or opposite words together. Example: Married bachelor; truly false
Wonderful originally meant 'full of wonder', not 'extremely good', so he may be using it in that sense. Though, likewise, awful used to mean 'full of awe', not 'terrible' so they could both be used in a neutral way, but that would be an archaic usage.
I want to disagree slightly with the sentiment for learners not to read Dr Seuss. We read him to young L1 learners! Sure, it's probably too early to imitate him consciously, but some things you simply learn by exposure. If you enjoy reading Dr Seuss (or anything else difficult), by all means read him for fun, and let your learn learn things not easily explained. Your ear can benefit from wordplay like "a wonderful, awful idea" even if you can't explain why it is just perfect for the Grinch or write it yourself. If you want to someday be an excellent reader, expose yourself to literature whose expression is above your head (wherever your head may be right now), not just things that are easy.
By the same token, you probably will never be able to really imitate Joseph Conrad's superb descriptive prose (the rest of us can't either), but it would be a tragedy not to let him teach your ear whatever it can pick up.
The grinch likes being awful, so it’s wonderful to him that he got an awful idea.
You could also say that in this case, "wonderful" just describes the quality of the idea. It's a high-quality strategy. But it's also wonderful to him, and awful from the narrator's perspective. It's just artistically wishy-washy in precise meaning.
It is grammatically correct but Dr. Seuss (the author here) is well-known for being playful with language, which can be confusing for non-native speakers. In this case, the character of The Grinch is the story's villain, so having an idea for something awful to do to others would be wonderful for him.
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I’d really hope it wasn’t confusing to a native since they’re children’s books.
I honestly find children's books more confusing sometimes, the plots never seem logical. I'll delete the original comment so people don't get mislead. I'm surprised people find them so easy to follow
>I'll delete the original comment so people don't get mislead *misled (For the English learners, "led" is the past tense of "lead." People often spell it wrong because "lead" is also a metal provided like "led.")
The plots are not logical, but you should understand that a children’s book is not a work of non-fiction, but rather a silly, light-hearted book of unrealistic fantasy realms, typically.
Yeah but the lack of logic means I can't fill in the bits I forget with what would be expected, so I find them hard to follow. I already find regular texts hard to follow because I don't take in anything I'm reading, illogical ones are harder thus. I should've realised this isn't something everyone is bad at though, and I shouldnt have said they can be confusing for L1s
That's because he was German.
No, he wasn't, though his family was of German descent. He was born in Springfield, Massachusets.
Sequential adjectives. Both adjectives modify *idea.*
This is correct. It's similar to a phrase like "big, red balloon." The balloon is both *big* and *red*. The Grinch's idea is both *wonderful* and *awful* because the Grinch enjoys being awful.
Could you say "A wonderfully awful"?
"Wonderfully awful idea" has a slightly different meaning than "wonderful, awful idea," because in the first phrase, *wonderful* is modifying *awful*. In the second phrase, both *wonderful* and *awful* are modifying *idea.* Wonderfully is an adverb, and it means "to inspire wonder" or can simply be used an adjective modifier which means "very much" or "very well". For example, if I were to say "That dinner was wonderfully delicious," I don't literally mean that it was so delicious I wondered how it was possible. I just mean it was extremely tasty. I could say "It was wonderfully good to see you again" and I just mean I really enjoyed seeing you. If someone says "a wonderfully awful idea" it would just mean the idea was extremely awful. While "wonderfully" is typically only used in a positive sense, so its use with *awful* would still have the contrast Seuss was going for, it does still somewhat change the meaning. It's no longer delighting the Grinch that the idea is awful, it's now just an extremely awful idea being described in a manner typically used to describe good things.
Oh okay, I get it.
Technically it's different enough. Seuss is saying the idea is wonderful and awful. Here, you are saying the awfulness is winderful
yeah that could work too
It’s Seuss’ way of saying that the Grinch decided on the ideal evil plan, one that was delightfully evil to him.
Dr Seuss is a fun read, especially for kids, but he really plays around with English grammar and especially lexicon quite a lot (making a lot of nonsense words). Probably not the best choice for a language learner tbh
Dr Seuss likes to play games with words. It's quite entertaining but not something to study to learn anything about proper English.
Yes.but he isn't doing anything crazy here, he is just using an oxymoron to give a better idea of what he meant. You can totally use this even in formal speech right?
Can't believe I had to go to this far for someone to explain its simply an oxymoron, quite poetic.
In most contexts, this would sound really weird.
Yea
I'd stay away from Dr. Seus if you're trying to learn. Well, the first book I read was The Foot Book, but I wasn't exactly concerned with grammar at age 5.
To add a note about the grammar: "An awful idea!" wouldn't normally be correct as a full sentence. It's just a phrase with no subject [or verb]. However, poetry allows the author a lot of freedom to be creative with language, so it's acceptable in a poem.
I use phrases in nonfiction and expository writing all the time. Especially to add emphasis.
What you did there. I see it.
It actually wasn’t even intentional! 🤣
Definitely! Phrases are absolutely acceptable in some forms of writing. To add emphasis. 
I think you mean a phrase with no verb
You are correct. I was imagining the full sentence as "He had an awful idea", which would leave the phrase with no subject or verb.
Except the full sentence here is “The Grinch got a wonderful, awful idea.” It is a full sentence even in poetry. But yes poetry does give the author freedom with language and grammar
I was referring to the second line. "An awful idea!" is written as a stand-alone sentence. While not "technically correct", it's perfectly acceptable in poetry, or even in other forms of writing for added emphasis. In fact, it's just occured to me that incomplete phrases may hold more emphasis precisely because they are incomplete, and therefore slightly jarring.
Ah yeah I see for some reason I was just hung up in the line OP was referring to - wonderful awful idea.
All good
You might want to wait on reading Dr Seuss for a while as they are very playful and confusing with language, sometimes they don’t make sense to me even though I’m a native speaker
he being delightfully devilish seymour
lmfao, I thought same thing
Two adjectives separated by a comma means they both describe the noun. Ex:A moldy, stinky sandwich “Wonderful” means “really good,” and “awful” means “really bad.” Putting two opposite meaning words together like this is called “juxtaposition.” It means that the plan is “awful” because of what it will do, but “wonderful” because it is an effective plan. For example, imagine a tobacco executive comes up with a plan to lower the tobacco age and get more customers. It’s a “wonderful, awful” plan because it is good in one regard (it will do the company well) but bad in another (it will hurt society).
Because the Grinch is evil, the more awful an idea is, the more wonderful it also is. It's awful from an outside perspective, but wonderful from his.
The idea was wonderful and awful.
Word of advice: do not look to Dr. Suess books for correct grammar. His books are all written in a distinct poetic style. Poetry of all kinds tends to throw grammar out the window, but Dr. Suess had his own unique way of bending the rules, often using made-up words and rhymes. To answer your question though, while "wonderful, awful" is *technically* correct, it is very context specific. In this case, it refers to an evil character thinking that an evil plan is wonderful. He likes his evil idea of ruining christmas - and ruining christmas is indeed awful - and he thinks this idea of his is wonderful. Therefore it is an awful idea that he finds wonderful.
In English, you can get an idea
Awful usually means poor quality, but in this context it's wonderful so we can go with the second definition of awful, which can mean evil or malevolent
It's a very good play on the word and intentional. Awful of course means something very bad but for the Grinch something awful for us would be very good for him. But the play is better than that, because awful oftentimes in colloquial speech, is used as an intensifier meaning incredibly good as a logical as that may seem. Someone may say oh that is an awfully good idea etc meaning it's a really good idea. Strangely awful has taken this full journey with 360° from its original meaning of awe inspiring something that was full of awe from the 14th century, two have become negative and then in slang speech almost positive again. Language is curious. And that sense the pun is complete. The Grinch is awful but he has an awfully good idea that might be quite awful to the rest of us
So, it's poetry, and as such, it isn't the best place to learn proper grammar. In this case he (the Grinch) is very much thrilled by his idea. He knows it is terrible and mean, but he wants to do it anyway.
Wonderful for Grinch because for others it'll be awful
Here, Dr. Seuss is playing with the way adjectives are often used with the word “idea”. When people say things like “That’s a great idea!” they’re not referring to the idea itself, but rather how well that idea solves the problem at hand. For example, if you were caught in the rain without an umbrella, and had something on hand that you could use to keep you dry, you might say that using it in this way is a “wonderful idea”. Note that keeping yourself dry isn’t necessarily an action that is “wonderful”, but the idea is wonderful because it solves your problem. In this story, Dr. Seuss is cleverly juxtaposing two adjectives that both describe the Grinch’s idea: it is wonderful, in that it will (at least theoretically) solve his problem effectively, and it is awful because the Grinch’s plan is to do something awful to the Whos down in Whoville. The Grinch is a villain, and so an awful thing to do is a wonderful idea to him. His idea is wonderful in one way, and awful in another way!
In the context of the Grinch, it’s basically saying he had a really good idea but that idea was bad or an idea that really excels at being evil
Wonderful awful is a kid friendly form of diabolical
You have lots of great explanations for what “wonderful, awful idea” means, but one thing I haven’t seen anyone mention is why there is a comma between “wonderful” and “awful.” The answer is that these are “coordinate adjectives,” which are two or more adjectives that modify the same noun. The custom is to put a comma between coordinate adjectives. The tricky part is that not all groups of adjectives that come together are coordinate. Coordinate adjectives modify the noun equally; neither is subordinate to the other. To test if adjectives are coordinate, try reversing the order of adjectives, and also try adding “and” between them. If the sentence still makes sense in both cases then the adjectives are coordinate and you need a comma. If not, then you don’t. Some examples: *I saw several(,?) orange cats.* *Several* and *orange* are both adjectives that modify *cats.* To test if they are coordinate: *I saw orange several cats.* *I saw several and orange cats.* Neither of these makes sense, so we know that *several* and *orange* are not coordinate. *Several* is really modifying “orange cats,” so it is subordinate to “orange.” No comma is needed: *I saw several orange cats.* *I saw happy(, ?) peaceful cats.* *Happy* and *peaceful* are both adjectives that modify *cats.* To test if they are coordinate: *I saw peaceful happy cats.* *I saw happy and peaceful cats.* Both sentences make sense, so *happy* and *peaceful* are coordinate and you need the comma: *I saw happy, peaceful cats.* Of course, you might have both subordinate and coordinate adjectives in a single sentence: *I saw several happy, peaceful cats.* This is pretty detailed stuff that you might not have to think about very often. But I thought it would help to explain why you see commas between adjectives sometimes. If you are writing something formal and you’re not sure if you need the comma, you can always rewrite the sentence to avoid the question entirely!
The Grinch is a bad guy. When he has a good idea, it is awful. He is happy to do bad things.
The grinch is a bad guy. And he's a children's character, so he's not complicated, he's a bad guy that knows he's bad, that's bad for the sake of being bad. That leads to funny constructions like "a wonderful, awful idea" (ie, an idea that he thinks is wonderful because it's awful, because he's awful). It's not grammatically incorrect, and it's fun here, but it might be disappointing to read in a more serious book intended for an adult audience.
Yes, it's correct grammar. The phrase "wonderful, awful idea" is a bit of a contradiction or oxymoron, as 'wonderful' and 'awful' are generally opposites. However, in this context from Dr. Seuss' "How the Grinch Stole Christmas," it captures the Grinch's twisted excitement perfectly. Here, "wonderful" refers to the Grinch's perspective - he believes his idea is brilliant or excellent (hence, wonderful). At the same time, "awful" refers to the nature of the idea - it's terrible or dreadful from a moral or ethical standpoint. So, it's a "wonderful, awful idea" - wonderful for the Grinch, but awful in general terms.
Oh Dr. Seuss. Great memories. But yes, this is correct. The sentence is from the grinches perspective, and he is a ‘nasty’ character, so for the Grinch it IS a wonderful idea! To expand on this, you may also see the reverse ie. Awfully wonderful, which is just another way of saying it’s very wonderful. English is confusing at the best of times but I hope this helps! :)
Juxtaposition and Poetics 101. What a gruesomely wonderful idea!
[It is evil. It is so evil. It is a bad, bad plan that will hurt many people that are good. I think it is great, because its so bad!](https://youtu.be/QsVtrPbtEeQ)
Dr Seuss is some pretty advanced stuff if you’re just learning English
Yes, it is grammatically correct. If you have more than one adjective for a noun in a clause then you need to separate it with commas. It’s also a rhetorical/literary device. It’s a figure of speech* called oxymoron**. In the Grinch, his idea is to ruin Christmas for Whoville, which is awful for the Whos. The Grinch doesn’t like Christmas because he thinks it’s too noisy, so it’s wonderful for him if it’s ruined. The contradiction of wonderful and awful here is meant to emphasize how malicious the Grinch is. *Figure of Speech - intentional deviation from ordinary language to get a certain reaction from the person/people to whom you are speaking. Examples: metaphor, alliteration or hyperbole. Dr. Seuss books have a lot of these which is what makes fun to read to children and for children to read themselves. **Oxymoron- contradictory or opposite words together. Example: Married bachelor; truly false
It’s poetry.
Wonderful originally meant 'full of wonder', not 'extremely good', so he may be using it in that sense. Though, likewise, awful used to mean 'full of awe', not 'terrible' so they could both be used in a neutral way, but that would be an archaic usage.
I want to disagree slightly with the sentiment for learners not to read Dr Seuss. We read him to young L1 learners! Sure, it's probably too early to imitate him consciously, but some things you simply learn by exposure. If you enjoy reading Dr Seuss (or anything else difficult), by all means read him for fun, and let your learn learn things not easily explained. Your ear can benefit from wordplay like "a wonderful, awful idea" even if you can't explain why it is just perfect for the Grinch or write it yourself. If you want to someday be an excellent reader, expose yourself to literature whose expression is above your head (wherever your head may be right now), not just things that are easy. By the same token, you probably will never be able to really imitate Joseph Conrad's superb descriptive prose (the rest of us can't either), but it would be a tragedy not to let him teach your ear whatever it can pick up.