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One of my former students would like to brush up on her knowledge of cleft sentences and
pseudo-cleft sentences. Well, here's some information about them:
A cleft sentence is a sentence which has been divided into two parts, each with its own verb, to
emphasize a particular piece of information. The first sentence begins with It plus the
corresponding form of the verb to be, followed by the element which is being emphasized, and
the second is generally a that-relative clause. For example, the sentence My brother married
Alice in Oxford in 1999 can be turned into the following cleft sentences:
When there is a what-clause which emphasizes the action itself, we have a pseudo-cleft sentence:
You've spoilt everything becomes What you've done is (to) spoil everything
All is used instead of what when the meaning is the only thing that:
The only thing I did was (to) drink a couple of beers becomes All I did was (to) drink a couple of
beers.
but, in pseudo-cleft sentences with where or when, the wh-clause is more usually found as
subject complement:
Who I mean is the chief inspector or, more commonly, The chief inspector is who I mean
How he talked is with a Scottish accent or, more commonly, With a Scottish accent is how he
talked
PRACTICE
** Turn the following sentences into pseudo-cleft sentences, headed by the word in brackets:
KEY
*
a - It was in Paris that I met my wife
b - Ii was in September that we were married
c - It was Bruno who/that reported us to the police
d - It's the manager himself who/that wants to speak to you
e - Benidorm is a nice place for a holiday, but it's to Marbella that I'm going this summer
f - It's my left leg that hurts, not the right one
**
a - What you need is a good cup of tea
b - What I'll do is (to) write a letter to The Times
c - What I liked best was her performance
d - All I did was (to) drink a couple of pints with my colleagues.