What's wrong with "I'll open you the door"?

Question

When I call the buzzer outside my girlfriend's flat, she sometimes says *"I'll open you the door". I correct this to "I'll open the door for you".

I've never heard a native speaker say it the first way, which is why I think it's wrong. But I can't explain why.

There is a pattern in lots of English phrases that would suggest both are correct. A few common examples:

1. Give the keys to me before you go — Give me the keys before you go

2. I'll buy a coffee for you at the cafe — I'll buy you a coffee at the cafe

3. We sent a text to Martin on his birthday — We sent Martin a text on his birthday

The left-hand side is more formal, and the right-hand side is more common in everyday speech.

What do you call this pattern?

What makes the 'open-the-door' sentence an exception?

Answer 1

The answer to the presenting question is:

• *I'll open you the door.

is ungrammatical because you won't wind up owning the door by virtue of my opening it.

Ordinary bitransitive verbs of transfer (tell, throw, bring, hand, pass, send, etc.), where the direct object (the trajector, semantically) is transferred from the subject (the source) to the indirect object (the goal), normally are subject to the Dative Alternation:

• I'll tell/throw/bring/hand/pass/send the answer to him.
• I'll tell/throw/bring/hand/pass/send him the answer.

Besides these, however, there's also a Benefactive construction, which uses for instead of to, and identifies someone for whose benefit something is done. This can be added to any sentence, 3-place bitransitive, 2-place transitive, or 1-place intransitive. Here we discuss only the transitives:

• I'll open the door for you. (Note -- you don't wind up with the door)
• I'll dig a clam for you. (Note -- you do wind up with the clam)
• I'll fix the car for you. (Note -- you don't wind up with the car)
• I'll fix a meal for you. (Note -- you do wind up with the meal)

In precisely those situations where the Benefactive object of for ends up possessing the direct object, the sentences can undergo Dative; in those cases where they don't, they can't.

• *I'll open you the door.
• I'll dig you a clam.
• *I'll fix you the car.
• I'll fix you a meal.

The last two sentences show that this extension of Dative to Benefactive is not governed by the verb used (fix in both cases), but by the intended meaning of the clause, including idioms, presuppositions, and metaphors.

Answer 2

Open is a transitive verb, not ditransitive, so it only takes one object, e.g. door.

I will open the door - one object (door)

* I will open you the door - two objects (you, door)

The second sentence seems weird because open doesn't take two objects.

A ditransitive verb takes two objects. For example, give can be ditransitive:

I gave you the money - two objects (you, money)

Answer 3

Open you the door isn't the exception at all. Most verbs capable of having both a direct and an indirect object don't readily accept the possibility of just specifying both objects without using any prepositions (but if/when you can do that, you always have to put the "indirect object" first).

There's a significant US/UK divide here, as illustrated by these Google Books results...

American usage: cash a check for me" (954), cash me a check (82).

British usage: cash a cheque for me (242), cash me a cheque (305).

As a Brit, I don't have any real problem with OP's exact usage and context, though I'm aware some people would find it anywhere between "slightly odd" and "totally ungrammatical". Taking it a bit further though, probably almost everyone would say that...

"Look who's in the driveway, Johnny! Go and open Auntie Ethel the door!" ¹

...is "totally unacceptable".

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EDIT: I don't really disagree with John Lawler's observation that the "ditransitive, prepositionless" dative alternation construction largely turns on whether the beneficiary ends up possessing the direct object. But it's not a hard-and-fast rule - particularly, I feel, in BrE.

As this source says, the above intended reception constraint [beneficiary ends up possessing object] comes with a certain amount of inherent fuzziness. And to illustrate that fuzziness, it gives actual "acceptability" figures for a few "marginal" constructions...

a: Could you iron me these shirts? [76%]
b: Could you wash me the dishes? [54%]
c: Could you clean me the windows? [47%]
d. Could you open me the door? [25%]

My own feeling is that this form is becoming more common (those figures were collected almost 40 years ago), and that it's more likely when the beneficiary is a pronoun (particularly, me). I'd be prepared to bet that if the above survey were repeated today, b above would score higher than 54%, but "Could you wash Mum the dishes?" would score significantly less.

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¹ When I wrote this answer over a decade ago, I was a bit intimidated to find myself at odds with John Lawler, and it's still true that I find splicing the "indirect object" (Auntie Ethel, here) between the verb and the direct object (the door) more natural when that indirect object is a pronoun.

But having mulled it over many times and discussed the usage with others, I must say that I personally no longer have even the slightest compunctions about *"Go and open Auntie Ethel the door!". If Americans still don't like it, that's just too bad.

Answer 4

As you noticed, many verbs can take an indirect object, and can also express the indirect object with to or for. But there is no rule that anything expressed with to or for must be convertible to an indirect object, and therefore "open the door" is not an exception to the rule.

There are plenty of examples of verbs that work this way:

Break a leg for me != Break me a leg.

I bought balloons for the party != I bought the party balloons.

They brought the discrepancy to the director's attention != They brought the director's attention the discrepancy.

There's nothing special about open that prevents it from taking an indirect object; if anything, the "special" verbs are the ones that do take the indirect object.