Грамматика английского языка Морфология. Синтаксис (стр. 13 из 71)

III

to account for

to agree upon

to appeal to

to call on

to comment on (upon)

to deal with

to decide on

to depend (up)on

to dispose of

to dwell upon

to hear of

to insist on

to interfere with

to laugh at

to listen to

to look at

to look for

to look into

to object to

to pay for

to provide for

to put up with

to read to

to refer to

to rely on

to send for

to speak about (of)

to speak to

to talk about (of)

to think about (of)

to touch upon

to wait for

to wonder at

to catch sight of

to lose sight of

to find fault with

to make fun of

to make a fuss of

to make use of

to pay attention to

to put an end (a stop) to

to put up with

to set fire to

to take notice of

to take advantage of

to take care of

to arrive at

to come to

to live in

to sleep in

to sit in (on)

Group I in the list contains the majority (but not all) of prepositional transitive verbs. The list could be continued, for a number of verbs of the kind are used occasionally, but the pattern itself is very productive.

Some prepositional monotransitive verbs have non-prepositional equivalents, e.g. to account for is a synonym for to explain, to look on - to regard, to speak (talk) about - to discuss.

Your absence must be accounted for. = Your absence must be explained.

Group II contains phraseological units based on the fusion of a monotransitive verb and a noun as direct object. These units express one notion and function as prepositional verbs. Many of them have synonyms among monotransitive verbs, prepositional and non-prepositional:

to take care of to find fault with to put an end to to put up with to make fun of

- to look after, to tend; - to grumble at, about, to criticize; - to stop; - to reconcile oneself to; - to laugh at, to mock.

Like single prepositional verbs the phraseological units with the verb in the passive voice are usually rendered in Russian by means of indefinite personal or impersonal constructions.

In hospital patients are taken great care of.

The boy was the only child and was made a

lot of fuss of.

I’m not prepared to think that I’m being made

a fool of.

В госпитале за больными хорошо ухаживают.

Мальчик был единственным ребенком в семье, и с ним много возились.

Мне не хочется думать, что меня дурачат.

Sometimes a phraseological unit is split and the original direct object becomes the subject of the passive construction (the direct passive).

No notice was taken of the boy at first. - Сначала мальчика не замечали.

Group III contains a short list of intransitive verbs used with prepositional nominal groups functioning as prepositional objects or adverbial modifiers. These may form passive constructions by analogy with other verbs used with prepositions:

No conclusion was arrived at. His bed hasn’t been slept in. Such a dress can’t be sat down in.

He пришли ни к какому заключению. В его постели не спали. (Она не смята) В таком платье нельзя садиться.

The use of the passive voice

§ 71. The passive voice is widely used in English. It is used alongside the active voice in written and spoken English. Passive constructions are often used instead of active constructions in sentences beginning with an indefinite pronoun, a noun or a pronoun of indefinite reference.

Somebody left the dog in the garden.

Has anybody answered your questions?

People will laugh at you for your trouble.

They told me to go away.

= The dog was left in the garden.

= Have your questions been answered?

= You will be laughed at for your trouble.

= I was told to go away.

It is evident that in the process of speech passive constructions arise naturally, not as a result of conversion from the active into the passive.

A passive construction is preferable in case when the speaker is interested in what happens to the person or thing denoted by the subject. The verb or the whole verb phrase is thus made more prominent. The agent or the source of the action is not mentioned at all, either because it is unknown or because it is of no particular importance in the utterance, or else it is evident from the context or the situation. The predicate verb with its modifiers contains a new and most important item of information and is of great communicative value.

We were brought up together.

I am always being contradicted.

Thank you for your help, but it is no longer required.

You will be met as you leave the airport, and you will be given another ticket.

In silence the soup was finished - excellent, if a little thick; and fish was brought. In silence it was

handed.

There are a number of conventional expressions where the passive voice is constantly used.

The novel was published in 1929.

Shakespeare was born in 1564.

The use of the agentive by-object

§ 72. The use of the agentive by-object is highly restricted, it occurs in one case out of five, and even less frequently in colloquial speech and imaginative prose. However, when it does occur, the by-object is of great communicative value, and its elimination would often make the meaning of the verb incomplete and the sentence devoid of meaning.

The agent may be a living being, or any thing or notion that can be the source of the action.

The whole scene was being enacted by puppets.

In some areas the picture has been barely touched by the brush.

I was wounded by a landmine.

The distant mountain had been formed by fire and water.

How much was she influenced by that fake idea?

Besides a noun and very rarely a pronoun, a by-object may be a gerundial phrase or complex, or a subordinate clause.

I was then awakened only by knocking on the window and Annie telling the person responsible to go off.

She didn’t really know anything about people, she was always being taken in by what they told her.

Owing to its communicative value and the final position in the sentence, the by-object may be expanded, if necessary, to an extent that is hardly possible in the subject group, as in this commentary on Cezanne's painting:

“The Card Players.” The subject of this painting of two peasants playing cards was probably inspired by a similar composition by one of the brothers de Pack, French painters of the seventeenth century whose work Cezanne admired.

The category of mood

§ 73. The meaning of this category is the attitude of the speaker or writer towards the content of the sentence, whether the speaker considers the action real, unreal, desirable, necessary, etc. It is expressed in the form of the verb.

There are three moods in English - the indicative mood, the imperative mood and the subjunctive mood.

The indicative mood

§ 74. The indicative mood form shows that what is said must be regarded as a fact, as something which has occurred or is occurring at the moment of speaking or will occur in the future. It may denote actions with different time-reference and different aspective characteristics. Therefore the indicative mood has a wide variety of tense and aspect forms in the active and passive voice.

The imperative mood

§ 75. The imperative mood expresses a command or a request to perform an action addressed to somebody, but not the action itself. As it does not actually denote an action as a real act, it has no tense category; the unfulfilled action always refers to the future. Aspect distinctions and voice distinctions are not characteristic of the imperative mood, although forms such as, be writing, be warned sometimes occur.

The imperative mood form coincides with the plain stem of the verb, for example: Come here! Sit down. The negative form is built by means of the auxiliary do + the negative particle not (the contracted form is don’t). This form is always addressed to the second person.

Do not take it away.

Don’t worry about the child.

Don’t be a fool.

Note:

Do is also used in commands or requests to make them more emphatic: Do come and stay with us. Do be quiet.

In commands and requests addressed to a first or third person (or persons) the analytical form let + infinitive without the particle to is used. The verb let functions as an auxiliary, and it partly loses its lexical meaning. The person addressed is expressed by the personal pronoun in the objective case.

Let us go together.

Let him finish his dinner first.

Let Andrew do it himself.

In negative sentences the analytical forms take the particle not without an auxiliary.

Let us not argue on the matter.

Let him not overestimate his chances.

Let her not go any further.

Note:

In sentences like Don’t let him go the negation refers to the verb let, which in this case fully retains its original meaning of permission.

The analytical forms differ in meaning from the synthetic forms, because their meaning is closely connected with the meaning of the pronoun included in the form. Thus let us do smth denotes an invitation to a joint action, not an order or a request. Let him do it retains to some extent the meaning of permission. In the form let me (let me do it) the first person singular does not convey any imperative meaning and should not therefore be regarded as the imperative. It conveys the meaning of I am eager to do it, allow me to do it.

The imperative mood form can’t be used in questions.

The subjunctive mood

§ 76. The subjunctive mood is the category of the verb which is used to express non-facts: unreal or hypothetical actions or states. A hypothetical action or state may be viewed upon as desired, necessary, possible, supposed, imaginary, or contradicting reality.

Different forms of the verb are employed for this purpose.

The synthetic forms

§ 77. In Old English the subjunctive mood was expressed by a special system of forms with a special set of inflections, different from those of the indicative. In the course of time, however, most of the inflections were lost, and the difference between the forms of the subjunctive and those of the indicative has almost disappeared. In Modern English there remain only two synthetic forms of the old regular system of the subjunctive, which differ from the forms of the indicative. Although their meaning and use have changed considerably, they are often called by their old names: the present subjunctive and the past subjunctive.

I. The present subjunctive coincides with the plain verb stem (be, go, see) for all persons in both the singular and the plural. It denotes a hypothetical action referring to the present or future. Of these surviving forms only be is always distinct from the indicative forms and is therefore rather current.

she

you

they

be, take, resent, etc.

He required that all be kept secret.

Other verbs are rarely used in the subjunctive in informal style, because their subjunctive forms coincide with the indicative except in the 3rd person singular. They are confined mainly to formal style and formulaic expressions - prayers, wishes, which should be memorized as wholes.

It is natural enough the enemy resent it.

Heaven forbid! The devil take him!

Long live freedom! God save the king!

II. The past subjunctive is even more restricted in its usage; it exists in Modern English only in the form were, which is used for all persons both in the singular and plural. It refers the hypothetical action to the present or future and shows that it contradicts reality.

If I were you!

If you were there!

If it were true!

The modem tendency, however, is to use was and were in accordance with the rules of agreement (he was, they were).

The non-factual forms of the tenses

§ 78. Owing to the same process of the obliteration of distinctions between the old subjunctive and the indicative the same forms have come to be used for both purposes in Modern English. To differentiate those used to express hypothetical actions or states (non-facts) from tenses in the indicative they will be called non-factual forms of the tenses.

The non-factual past indefinite and past continuous are used to denote hypothetical actions in the present or future; the non-factual past perfect and past perfect continuous denote hypothetical actions in the past. These two pairs of forms differ not only in their time-reference but also in their degree of improbability: If I had only known expresses greater improbability than If I only knew because it refers to a time which has already passed. In Russian this difference is not reflected in the form of the verb.

The wide use of the non-factual past indefinite (If I knew, if he came...) probably accounts for the strong tendency in Modern English to substitute was for the past subjunctive form were, at least in less formal style. This tendency makes the system of subjunctive mood forms more similar and comparable to the system of indicative mood forms: if I knew..., if I was (instead of were), I wish I knew..., I wish I was (instead of were).

On the other hand, were is often used instead of was in the non-factual past continuous.

He smiled as if he were enjoying the situation.