Ryan Gabbard at The Audhumlan Conspiracy has asked for help in figuring out "when [it is] grammatical to call someone by an adjective." He says
These all sound fine to me: Come here
gorgeous/handsome/silly/beautiful/ugly/stupid/goofy
But these sound horrible: "Come here
*odd/*wise/*tired/*old/*young/*pedantic/
*obsequious/*foolish/*arrogant/*weird/*cute"
My judgments are the same. The context is a discussion of the proper way to address a solicitor general.
The set of adjectives that work in T-shirt phrases like "I'm with stupid" seems to be similar. There's also the question of which adjectives can be used as nicknames, like "Slim", "Red", and so on -- these can of course also be used as vocatives.
Posted by Mark Liberman at January 18, 2004 08:28 AM