A word can have more than one antonym. The following are all antonyms of good:
bad
badness
corrupt
evil
evilness
malicious
sour
wicked
The first point is that good, like many words, can be a noun or an adjective, so its antonyms will be a mix of nouns and adjectives too. The second point is that antonyms do not have to be exact opposites. There are two types of antonyms:
Graded antonyms
Complementary antonyms
Graded Antonyms
Graded antonyms do not have to be opposites of equal weighting. They allow for shades of oppositeness. For example, the following are all antonyms for good:
unsatisfactory
poor
bad
terrible
Complementary Antonyms
Complementary antonyms offer no middle ground. With complementary antonyms, each word only has one antonym. (The reason for that is often a relationship between the two words.) For example:
1 / 0
before / after
buy / sell
dead / alive
doctor / patient
husband / wife
man / woman
off / on
predator / prey
yes / no
Adding a Prefix to Form an Antonym
Quite often, an antonym can be made by adding a prefix. For example:
likely / unlikely
able / unable
entity / nonentity
combatant / noncombatant
typical / atypical
symmetrical / asymmetrical
decent / indecent
discreet / indiscreet
A Quick Test
This test has questions.
You will score at least 5 points for a correct answer.
You will score bonus points for answering the questions quickly.
