I had to write an essay in spanish, and though I got a great grade, I had a lot of grammatical errors. I noticed it's pretty glaringly obvious I was using english sentence structure, "...Badajoz es un muy importante lugar..." vs "Badajoz es un lugar muy importante..." etc and things like that. I'm practicing more, but what's a good rule of thumb in the sentence structure in general for spanish vs english, and how to avoid accidentally writing the structure with english rules? Thank you :)
First, I’d like to say that your sentence isn’t wrong. It’s unusual, but not wrong. Saying es un muy importante lugar sounds like you are being extra emphatic.
When you talk about when adjectives go before or after the noun, it’s a matter of the “determiners”. Determiners are a subset of adjectives
The determiners that (almost) always go first are also adjectives in a way:
definite articles [el/la/los/las]
indefinite articles [un/una/unos/unas]
cardinal numbers [uno, dos, tres…]
ordinal numbers [primer(a), segundo/a, tercer(a)]
possessive pronouns [mi(s), tu(s), su(s)]
cuál, cuáles / cual, cuales
Just to name a few. Many of them are determiners related to quantity or relative concepts.
Es muy importante. = It’s very important
Es tan importante. = It’s so important.
Es poco importante. = It’s not very important at all.
Es algo importante. = It’s somewhat important. [or just “it’s something important” where algo is a noun; not used as “somewhat”]
Ordinal numbers are mostly in front, except when you’re talking about royalty names/titles:
el segundo piso = the second floor
Isabel II [Segunda] = Elizabeth II [the Second]
Alfonso X [Décimo] = Alfonso X [the Tenth]
With the average adjective, expect it to be behind the noun almost always:
un gato blanco = a white cat
el reloj roto = the broken clock/watch
mi cita importante = my important date/appointment
Changing that order makes it very significant or poetic, and possibly pretentious when used incorrectly. It emphasizes the adjective so much it becomes a super version of what it was, which in translation comes off using a stronger word choice:
un blanco gato = the pure white cat
el roto reloj = the destroyed clock
mi importante cita = my crucial date/appointment
There are plenty of adjectives where the placement changes the meaning as well, and those are the ones to watch out for.
el viejo amigo = the old friend, the long-time friendel amigo viejo = the friend who is old, the elderly friend
la misma cosa = the same thingla cosa misma = the thing itself
la Antigua Grecia = Ancient Greecela casa antigua = the old housela antigua casa = the former house
la gran ciudad = the great city, the grand cityla ciudad grande = the big city, the large city
buen chico = good boy [behavior or overall]chico bueno = nice boy, kind boy [personality trait]
mal chico = bad boy [behavior or overall]chico malo = mean boy, unkind boy [personality trait]
triste persona = pitiful/miserable/tragic/wretched personpersona triste = sad person
pobre hombre = poor/pitiful manhombre pobre = poor/destitute man
cualquier persona = any personuna persona cualquiera = a normal person, an ordinary person, “any old person”
el nuevo teléfono = the newest phone / the latest phoneel teléfono nuevo = the new phone, the recent phone
pura suerte = pure luck, sheer luckuna persona pura = a pure person
la única cosa = the only thingla persona única = the unique personhija única = only daughter
a simple vista = merely lookingla comida simple = simple cooking
rara vez = rarely [not often]persona rara = strange person [weird]
duras decisiones = hard decision [difficult or painful]piedras duras = hard rocks [hard or tough usually as far as touching]
alta calidad = high quality, best quality, premium qualitymontaña alta = high/tall mountainpersona alta = tall person
In your case you said something to the effect of “THE ABSOLUTE MOST IMPORTANT PLACE” rather than “a very important place”.
Just be careful because if you put all of your adjectives before, you start to sound like a very flowery writer and it comes off as you not knowing the rules, or sounding very full of yourself.
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