When I first learnt English, I thought this type of formulation only worked with a few verbs like “do”, “have”,“should” (ex: “Should I do this? No, I shouldn’t.”)
More recently I also encountered “Need I?” and “needn’t”, tho they’re more rarely used. But this got me wondering, is it still an exceptional construction, with “need” being one of the exceptions, or can it be done with every verbs? For example, are the following sentences correct:
- Read you mangas? No, I readn’t them.
- Grow they potatoes? No, they grown’t these.
- Sounds it like a good idea? No, it soundsn’t.
I know talking like this would raise a few eyebrows, but does it break any established rule?
“Need” and “dare” are auxiliary verbs for some speakers. That’s what allows them to bypass the “do-support rule” for those speakers.
On the other hand “read”, “grow”, “sound” are not auxiliaries, so they require do-support in this sort of negation.