I saw a sentence in Cambridge IELTS 14 said,
"Of particular interest were those built to the designs of John Shaw Billings."
I have some questions about it:
- What is the difference between "abstract nouns" and "of + abstract nouns"
I have seen some "of + abstract nouns" structure as objects in sentences like:
"It’s a book that will be of interest to a wide range of readers."
"It is of the utmost importance that this matter is kept confidential."
I just don't understand why there is an 'of' between verbs and objects. Can I say:
"It’s a book that will be interest to a wide range of readers."
"It is the utmost importance that this matter is kept confidential."?
Is this a special collocation to abstract nouns?
I've never seen concrete nouns being used like that, such as "This is of food that everyone can eat."
I wonder maybe this structure is some kind of omission.
For example,
"Be of interest" and "be of importance"
come from omission result of
"be (the things) of interest" and "be (the things) of importance".
Am I guessing right?
- When it comes to the first sentence in this question. Why it uses "were" instead of "was"?
Is it because this is an inverted sentence like:
"There were those..."?
Or is it, as my guess mentioned above, an omission losing the real subject like:
"(Things) of particular interest were those..."?
Or in fact, is it just Grammarly incorrect?