Questions on 得， 太， 就 - miscellanious

[AlexanderH]

Hey everyone --

I'm having a slow time figuring out the uses of :

A) 得 regarding descriptive complements

-- So there are 2 ways to give complements, right? I can say , for example, "You speak well. 你说得很好。" Or, "You speak Chinese well. 你说中文说得很好。" -- Does that make sense? One sentence doesn't have an object, one does? If the object isn't understood, you need to repeat the verb?

B) 太 regarding proper usage, versus 真 and 很.

-- For example, where do you place 太 in the sentence "This is really tasty." Or would you use 很 instead? 这是很好吃！

and C) 就 placement

-- What if I want to say "You must get to the movie (as early as) 7:00 pm.

你七点就得看电影。"

Did any of those sentences I wrote make sense?

Thank you once again

[renzhe]

-- So there are 2 ways to give complements, right? I can say , for example, "You speak well. 你说得很好。" Or, "You speak Chinese well. 你说中文说得很好。" -- Does that make sense? One sentence doesn't have an object, one does? If the object isn't understood, you need to repeat the verb?

Both of those are correct. You could also say:

你中文说得很好。

IOW, you can drop the first one, but it's less formal.

I don't quite get the second question, but 太 can be used to express that something is extremely good, like 太好了! It adds a very excited ring to it.

Of course, 真好吃！ and 很好吃! are both correct.

As for the last sentence, it doesn't sound right. You can't use 就 like that. You can use it to connect two events which happen in quick succession, for example, 我一见他就生气. (As soon as I see him, I get angry). You can't use it after a time word, it would sound roughly like "at seven o'clock, then immediately watch a movie", it doesn't make sense.

[AlexanderH]

In my chinese book, it says one use of 就 is to suggest to briefness, earliness, etc. of an event.

Could you please give a sentence describing what you mean?

[chrix]

Well, my 虚词词典 seems to agree. While the meaning explained by renzhe is indeed the main usage you can find in grammars and the like, there's this use "after a word indicating time to show that the speaker thinks the time is early or short".

I think just the situation given by AlexanderH is just a bit odd?

A bit of googling gives you examples like these:

- 才怪，我上班远，七点就得起。

- 我们七点就得出发

- 七点就得等在那

- 本来明早七点就得搭地铁去火车站

[imron]

Don't forget to also have a read of the grammar sticky, which covers a lot of discussion on these words.