The Communicative Grammar of English Workbook - Edward Woods, Rudy Coppieters 2002

17.8. Organising information - Other choices
Unit seventeen. Focusing

Sections 430-432; 488; 608; 613-618; 730; 740

Choices of position

The passive can be used to give a sentence end-focus or end-weight.

The position of the direct and indirect objects can be postponed for the same purpose.

Task one **

Rewrite the sentences below to give end-focus or end-weight to the underlined sections.

1. How could he afford such a large house?

His parents gave him the money.

2. They have proved the reasons he gave for meeting that woman false.

3. How did such a successful company collapse like that?

The Chief Executive made some poor decisions.

4. In 2001, they gave Peter Carey the prize for the second time.

5. The writer checked the samples he’d been sent carefully.

6. Don’t leave work for the exam to the last minute!

7. That he’d done so well in his career finally pleased his father.

8. That Marc insisted on spelling his name with a ’c’ instead of a ’k’ irritated his girlfriend.

9. Ivan often failed to contact his friends for months.

10. Cathie asked if she could leave early for a second time.

Task two **

Give end-focus or end-weight to the sections underlined in the article below.

More than fifty years after the event, it is instructive to look at how honestly Second World War leaders treated the civilian population. Were we regarded as delicate flowers? Did they give all the truth and nothing but the truth compatible with security to us?

“There may always be another reality. To make fiction of the truth we think we’ve arrived at,” said the playwright, Christopher Fry. Goodness knows he saw enough reality in the pioneer corps.

Beady-eyed people who have second thoughts about mighty events are revisionist historians. They can really make a veteran’s moustache bristle and steam gush from his ears. Burrowers and snufflers through the once-secret archives sometimes force us to face freshly revealed unpalatable truths: in the war, there was the usual tarnished brass - cowards, deserters, psychopaths and black marketeers supported the military geniuses, heroes, yeomen who were worthy of their country.