Beranda
Writing a simple sentence. We will now discuss about writing a simple sentence. A Simple sentence is a sentence with only one independent clause (also known as a main clause). A simple sentence, also called an independent clause, contains a subject and a verb, and it expresses a complete thought. The simple sentence is one of the four basic sentence structures. The other structures are the compound sentence, the complex sentence, and the compound-complex sentence.
Some students like to study in the mornings.Juan and Arturo play football every afternoon.Alicia goes to the library and studies every day.
A simple sentence
A subject and predicate, together, form a simple sentence. As used here, the term "simple" refers to the basic structure of a sentence. Simple sentences can be short or long, and can express simple or complex thoughts and may contain complex constructions, but the basic structure of the sentence is simple. Here are two simple sentences:
- John ate spaghetti.
- The boy from Conosha with the funny earring in his left ear devoured a dish of delicious Italian pasta a la Milanese.
These two sentences have the same structure:
John
ate
spaghetti.
The boy from Conosha with the funny earring in his left ear
devoured
a dish of delicious Italian pasta a la Milanese.
Both are simple sentences from a structural point of view. They both consist of a subject and a predicate indicating what the subject did. They are both composed of two noun phrases and a verb. They both can be reduced with pronouns to
He ate it.
Another Examples:
"Children are all foreigners."
(Ralph Waldo Emerson)
"Mother died today."
(Albert Camus, The Stranger, 1942)
"Of course, no man is entirely in his right mind at any time."
(Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger)
"Early to rise and early to bed makes a male healthy and wealthy and dead."
(James Thurber)
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismograph."
(Ken Kesey)
"Expect nothing. Live frugally on surprise."
(Alice Walker)
"I was wearing my powder-blue suit, with dark blue shirt, tie and display handkerchief, black brogues, black wool socks with dark blue clocks on them."
(Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, 1939)
"They shot the six cabinet ministers at half-past six in the morning against the wall of a hospital. There were pools of water in the courtyard. There were wet dead leaves on the paving of the courtyard. It rained hard. All the shutters of the hospital were nailed shut. One of the ministers was sick with typhoid. Two soldiers carried him downstairs and out into the rain." (Ernest Hemingway, Chapter Five of In Our Time. Charles Scribner's Sons, 1925)
"Lord Emsworth adjusted his pince-nez and sought inspiration from the wall-paper." (P.G. Wodehouse, Something Fresh, 1915)
"Atheism is a non-prophet organization."
(George Carlin)
Note that length alone does not determine structure, although it is often a factor. We are concerned with the complexity of structure, not length.
Having Practice in Writing Simple Sentence
You have read and learn it so it is time to test your understanding about this topic. Follow the link below to do an exercise about simple sentence.
This is the end of our discussion today about writing a simple sentence. You have learn about the theory and also being asked to do the exercise, hope that you get something important on this post.
References
Eslbee.com
Grammar.about
Criticalreading
