grammaticality - When can "very" modify a prepositional phrase?


In Hamlet, when Hammy Jr. asks Polonius whether a cloud looks like a whale, Polly replies,



Very like a whale.



In contemporary English, however, "very like ..." feels ungrammatical. You instead have to epenthetically say "very much like ...".


Interestingly this restriction doesn't seem to apply to some similar constructions; I find the following all acceptable:



  • "Very whale-like" (PP replaced with adjective)

  • "Very similar to a whale" (synonymous phrasal preposition)

  • "Really like a whale" (synonymous adverb)

  • "Exactly like a whale", "Truly like a whale", "Somewhat like a whale" (different adverb)

  • "Nothing like a whale" (adverb replaced with a word of arguable lexical class)

  • "Very near a whale" (different preposition)

  • Cerberus pointed out (in chat) that "That is so very like you" is also acceptable (different argument to preposition)


But these still unacceptable:



  • *"Very by a whale", *"Very in a whale", *"Very inside a whale", *"Very toward a whale" (different preposition)

    • But "Directly by/in/inside/toward a whale" are fine.




What determines whether "very" can modify a prepositional phrase?




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