The speaker launched a most significant personal attack on the Prime Minister. The most significant of the arguments in a dispute is not necessarily the most spectacular one

While the phrase "a most significant (personal) attack" in the first of the two examples gives the idea of rather a high degree of the quality expressed irrespective of any directly introduced or implied comparison with other attacks on the Prime Minister, the phrase "the most significant of the ar­guments" expresses exactly the superlative degree of the quality in relation to the immediately introduced com­parison with all the rest of the arguments in a dispute; the same holds true of the phrase "the most spectacular one". It is this exclusion of the outwardly superlative ad­jective from a comparison that makes it into a simple elative, with its most-constituent turned from the superlative aux­iliary into a kind of a lexical intensifier.

The definite article with the elative most-construction is also possible, if leaving the elative function less distinctly recognizable (in oral speech the elative most is commonly left unstressed, the absence of stress serving as a negative mark of the elative). Cf.: I found myself in the most awkward situation, for I couldn't give a satisfactory answer to any question asked by the visitors.

Now, the synthetical superlative degree, as is known, can be used in the elative function as well, the distinguishing feature of the latter being its exclusion from a comparison.

Cf.:

Unfortunately, our cooperation with Danny proved the worst experience for both of us. No doubt Mr. Snider will show you his collection of minerals with the greatest pleas­ure.

And this fact gives us a clue for understanding the ex­pressive nature of the elative superlative as such — the na­ture that provides it with a permanent grammatico-stylistic status in the language. Indeed, the expressive peculiarity of the form consists exactly in the immediate combination of the two features which outwardly contradict each other:

the categorial form of the superlative on the one hand, and the absence of a comparison on the other.

That the categorial form of the superlative (i.e. the su­perlative with its general functional specification) is essen­tial also for the expression of the elative semantics can, how­ever paradoxical it might appear, be very well illustrated by the elative use of the comparative degree. Indeed, the com­parative combination featuring the dative comparative de­gree is constructed in such a way as to place it in the func­tional position of unrestricted superiority, i.e. in the po­sition specifically characteristic of the superlative. E.g.:

Nothing gives me greater pleasure than to greet you as our guest of honour. There is nothing more refreshing than a good swim.

The parallelism of functions between the two forms of comparison (the comparative degree and the superlative de­gree) in such and like examples is unquestionable.

As we see, the elative superlative, though it is not the regular superlative in the grammatical sense, is still a kind of a specific, grammatically featured construction. This grammatical specification distinguishes it from common elative constructions which may be generally defined as syn­tactic combinations of an intensely high estimation. E.g.:

an extremely important amendment; a matter of exceeding urgency; quite an unparalleled beauty; etc.

Thus, from a grammatical point of view, the elative su­perlative, though semantically it is "elevated", is nothing else but a degraded superlative, and its distinct featuring mark with the analytical superlative degree is the indefinite article: the two forms of the superlative of different function­al purposes receive the two different marks (if not quite rig­orously separated in actual uses) by the article determina­tion treatment.

It follows from the above that the possibility of the most-combination to be used with the indefinite article cannot in any way be demonstrative of its non-grammatical character, since the functions of the two superlative combinations in question, the elative superlative and the genuine superla­tive, are different.

Moreover, the use of the indefinite article with the syn­thetical superlative in the degraded, dative function is not altogether impossible, though somehow such a possibility is bluntly denied by certain grammatical manuals. Cf.: He made a last lame effort to delay the experiment; but Basil was impervious to suggestion.

But there is one more possibility to formally differentiate the direct and dative functions of the synthetical superlative, namely, by using the zero article with the superlative. This latter possibility is noted in some grammar books (Ganshina, Vasilevskaya, 85). Cf.: Suddenly I was seized with a sen­sation of deepest regret.

However, the general tendency of expressing the super­lative dative meaning is by using the analytical form. Inci­dentally, in the Russian language the tendency of usage is reverse: it is the synthetical form of the Russian superlative that is preferred in rendering the dative function. Cf.: слушали с живейшим интересом; повторялась скучнейшая история; попал в глупейшее положение и т.д.