 #2 (permalink) Sun Nov 01, 2009 20:11 pm Verb questions |
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1. and 2a.
Yes, there is an implicit "that": both sentences consist of two clauses each. Especially the interrogative clause is difficult to analyse. But let's replace the question ("what...") and relative clause ("how...") with independent assertions:
- What do you think is in there?
What becomes it:
You think (that) it is in there.
- ... how great you thought you were.
How becomes so:
You thought (that) you were so great.
The problem is that the places of interrogative and relative pronouns in their respective clauses are restricted: they often cannot go at the place they would go at in a normal clause; sometimes they cannot even go in the right clause, but must be placed in a different clause, as in the above examples.
- The man who saw me there: "who" must be at the first place in the clause "who saw me".
- I thought that the man saw me there: "I thought" must go before "that".
These two "musts" give a conflict when both types of clause are combined; that is why we get these odd sentences, which are quite correct. The result is:
- The man who I thought (that) saw me there.
In this type of sentence, "that" is usually left out. Note that "whom" would be wrong here, though you will often see it in sloppy writers; "who" is still the subject of "saw".
2b.
Verbs expressing some sort of sensory perception ("listening" in your example) can have a special construction, which is different from the one above:
- She saw him fall.
verb (saw) + object (what she was looking at: him) + infinitive without "to" (what she saw that the object did: fall).
Note that a participle is sometimes better in such a sentence:
- He saw her falling.
Strictly speaking, the infinitive is used when what you see is the action of falling, the participle when what you see is the thing er person (that does it); but the difference is often negligible. |
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 Cerberus™
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 11 Feb 2009
Posts: 1342
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