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My lovely idea.

Does this sentence express the idea belonging to me or just the fact that I love the idea (which is not necessary mine)?

I think this exact phrasing and grammar only expresses me pointing to an idea which is very loved by me.

I think if someone would want to emphasize that this idea is his and it is lovely he should have used "My, lovely, idea". To say "My idea, which is lovely".

What do you think?

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  • These aren't nuances.
    – Robusto
    Dec 27, 2012 at 16:38
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    Can you give the context, maybe even the paragraph in which this extremely short fragment is to be used?
    – Mitch
    Dec 27, 2012 at 16:50

2 Answers 2

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My is classified as a determiner, like a, the, this, that, some, any. Such words are always placed at the head of a list of a modifiers and are never separated by a comma from the following words.

Accordingly, My x, y, z idea always means My idea which is x, y and z.

So if you want to communicate that the idea is not yours but is lovely in your estimation, you must write something like This idea, which appears lovely to me or (awkwardly, but acceptable in informal writing) This lovely (to me) idea.

Lovely, by the way, means beautiful, comely rather than lovable, beloved.

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  • Ahh yes! O thou blacke weed, Why art so louely faire?
    – spiceyokooko
    Dec 27, 2012 at 17:00
  • @spiceyokooko A lovely citation. In Shakespeare I think the transition is only halfway consummated, so he's able to play with the double sense (consider Tamara's references to her lovely Moor); but already in 1903 OED 1 declares use in the sense "worthy of love" to be obsolete.
    – StoneyB on hiatus
    Dec 27, 2012 at 17:10
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A sentence consists of at least a subject and a verb. The string

My lovely idea.

has neither of it, it is only an object (with preposition). So, it is not a sentence at all.

This is a lovely idea.

would be correct.

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