Meaning of cleft sentence | Babel Free

Definitions

A complex sentence whose meaning could be expressed by a simple sentence, that has a dependent clause in front of the main clause, and that typically stresses a particular constituent.

Equivalents

Examples

“Quirk et al (1972) say about the cleft sentence that it is "...so called because it divides a single clause into two separate sections, each with its own verb".”

“Following Bolinger (1972, 1977) and Gundel (1977), I assume that the introductory it of cleft sentences is referential[…].”

“Similar analyses of cleft sentences have been repeated in the linguistic literature ever since.”

“With the exception of the type Er war es, der mich davon abhielt, i.e. with the subject of the sentence in the cleft to emphasise it (see 3.6.2c), cleft sentence constructions rarely sound natural in German and are best avoided.”

CEFR level