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"Exactly," said Dumbledore, looking very seriously over the top of his half-moon glasses. "It would be enough to turn any boy's head. Famous before he can walk and talk! Famous for something he won't even remember! Can’t you see how much better off he'll be, growing up away from all that until he's ready to take it?" (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone)

Does the participial phrase take an adverbial role implying the cause of him being better off, or adjective role modifying ‘he’?

Listenever
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2 Answers2

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I consider “... how much better off he'll be, growing up away from ...” as nearly equivalent to “... how much better off he'll be, because of growing up away from ...”. In the latter form, growing up is a gerundial form of the phrasal verb grow up, and serves more like a noun than like an adjective or adverb.

James Waldby - jwpat7
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  • Yes - one could rephrase: Growing up away from all that - until he's ready to take it - will be much better for him. Don't you appreciate this? (But you can tell why it's Mrs Rowling who sold all those books.) – Edwin Ashworth Feb 27 '13 at 23:33
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The phrase "Can't you see how much better off" creates a somewhat complex grammatical sequence that is best understood if you break the sentence down into small parts.

Dumbledore's core thinking, in two sentences, would be: 1) Harry will be growing up away from all that 2) This will be better for him.

So you can think of "growing up away from all that" as a (gerundial) noun phrase -- "Growing up away from all that (subject) + will be + better for him"

There is an underlying or implicit "because" here, but it is not of central importance in understanding the grammar.

Kevin Mark
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