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Sun 27 Nov, 2016 11:17 am
Below is from Practical English Usage Third Edition (on page 253).
My question is at the bottom.
Questions beginning who/what/which + be can ask for a subject or a complement. Compare:
Who is the best player here? (This asks for a subject: a possible answer is John is the best player here.)
What is the time? (This asks for a complement: a possible answer is The time is 4.30, NOT 4.30 is the time.)
When we report the first kind of question (where who/what/which + be asks for a subject), two word orders are possible.
-Direct: What's the matter?
Indirect: 1. I asked what was the matter.
I asked what the matter was. [...]
This does not happen when who/what/which asks for a complement.
-Direct: 2. What's the time?
Indirect: She asked what the time was. (NOT USUALLY She asked what was the time.)
Do the parts in bold contradict each other? In "What's the matter?", is 'matter' also the complement, just as 'time' is the complement in the second sentence? If not, please explain to me why I'm wrong.
Thanks.
@tanguatlay,
In both your first and second pair of sentence structures, the meaning changes.
@tanguatlay,
Could somebody please help? Thanks.
In the statements What's the matter? and I asked what the matter was, the first indicates that something is wrong, hence you asked, What's the matter?, this relates more to an emotional reaction. The second seems to indicate that something is wrong with a specific item, such as a newspaper article or the hanging of a painting on the wall.
In your second set of statements, What's the time, can refer to the current time, amount of time a just completed task or race took, or is referring to a future event and asking at what time it will occur. The second part, She asked what the time was, lends itself to asking at what time something occurred.
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