Complex Complements of State

10/7/2021

This blog post is a quick note of a grammar point I was reviewing today (and will have to revisit). First off - let the Chinese Grammar Wiki tell us:

Complements are not a form of flattery (those are compliments); they're much more versatile than that!

and

Complements provide additional information associated with verbs, such as degree, result, direction, or possibility, and are extremely common

For instance, "吃了完" ate (and finished eating) is a complement. The state complement describes the achieved state of an action. They usually are adjective phrases, but sometimes are also verb phrases. State complement pattern is "V/ADJ + 得 + state complement". Examples and a thorough explanation of the grammar point are available at the definitive Chinese Grammar Wiki - State complement