Chinese grammar

[baraka]

Can anyone recommend a good grammar of Standard Chinese?

[linguoboy]

Can anyone recommend a good grammar of Standard Chinese?

I have both the Routledge Comprehensive grammar and Li and Thompson's Mandarin Chinese : a functional reference grammar. The latter is written by linguists for linguists and is mostly concerned with "doing syntax", which leads to a certain focus on marginal cases in order to discover the limits of certain constructions. The Routledge grammar, on the other hand, is content to analyse Chinese largely within the framework of traditional grammar. It gives you much more in the way of common phrases and constructions that you can drop into conversation with a few simple substitutions.

I know Zompist has quoted Chao's Grammar of spoken Chinese here before, but I don't have any experience with it. My impression is that it's more like Li and Thompson's book than Yip and Rimmington's.