341. ¿Cómo se dice?: It was so good coffee I had another cup. / It was such good coffee I had another cup.

La correcta es la segunda: It was such good coffee I had another cup.

So y such a menudo se usan mal, pese a que las reglas gramaticales que determinan su uso son muy claras.

Por lo que se refiere a such:

■ Delante de un sustantivo en singular usamos such a/an (+ adjetivo):

He’s such an idiot.

She’s such a skilled engineer.

■ Delante de sustantivos incontables o en plural se usa such (+ adjetivo):

They’re such friends.

They’re all such diligent students.

It’s such nonsense.

Por su parte, so se usa en los siguientes casos:

■ Delante de un adjetivo aislado (es decir, que no precede a un sustantivo) o de un adverbio:

She’s so skilled.

They’re so friendly.

They work so diligently.

■ Delante de much / many / little / few:

We had so little wood it was impossible to light a fire.

I have so much work to do that I can’t relax for a minute.

■ Delante de estructuras comparativas:

I find Dostoyevsky so much more interesting than Tolstoy.

También aparece en la estructura formal «so + adjetivo + a/an + sustantivo», que es propia de un estilo más sofisticado y, por tanto, más frecuente en el lenguaje escrito que en el oral:

It was so beautiful a view that we could scarcely believe our eyes.

The view was so beautiful that we could scarcely believe our eyes.

It was such a beautiful view that we could scarcely believe our eyes.

PARA SABER MÁS

Sobre el uso de so ⇒ 171.