下文摘錄自本人即將出版的英文工具書:
Since we are a small organization with low overhead, we can offer container fulls of high quality lumber at very attractive prices.
解析如下:
full當形容詞時的片語be full of (充滿著…;某些場合可用be filled with代替)的用法,在國中就學過了。但full當名詞的用法,卻很少被討論過。
container fulls of就如同containerfuls(滿滿一貨櫃;一貨櫃的量) of都是"整貨櫃的"的意思。fulls是full的複數名詞,意思為" 完全、全部";full(s) of之前常加上一個能夠表示容積大小的容器名稱,如bag、box、car、hand、shovel、spoon或truck等;要說"一湯匙的糖"可以用a spoon full of sugar或a spoonful of sugar,"兩湯匙的糖"可以用two spoon fulls of sugar或two spoonfuls of sugar。類似上述用法的相關字還有:
arm (armful);barrel (barrelful);basket (basketful);bottle (bottleful);bowl (bowlful);bucket (bucketful);can (canful);carton (cartonful);case (caseful);crate (crateful);cup (cupful);dish (dishful);fist(fistful);glass (glassful);house (houseful);jar (jarful);mouth (mouthful);pocket (pocketful);pot (potful);room (roomful);tank (tankful)
弧號內的粗體字有些字典查不到,基本上『名詞+ful』大部份還是名詞(但是少部份也可以當形容詞),『名詞+ful』的意思是『跟名詞這個容器容積大小一樣的量』,例如spoon(湯匙)是名詞,spoonful(一匙的量)也是名詞,只是兩者意義不同。spoonful的英文解釋是『the quantity that a spoon will hold』