Learn English – Passive construction(for infinitive verb)

infinitive-clausespassive-voicetransitivity

1

Active voice: He expects me to help him.

Passive(book answer): He expects to be helped by me.

Passive(my answer): It is expected by him that i should help him.

passive(my answer): It is expected by him to win the match.(if we change main clause in passive.

2

Active: It is time to take action.

Passive(book answer: It is time for action to be taken.

Passive(my answer): It is time that action should be taken.

I am confused here. In these sentences there are two clause for exp He expects me [to help him]. what is the subject of second part of sentence. which clause should be converted into passive.

[He decided to sell the car was changed into He decided that the car should be sold in the same book. so i take the clue and change #1 and #2 into passive according to that.]

Best Answer

1

I think the reason the book gives the answer stated in #1 is the subject of your question: passive construction of infinitive verbs. (I can't be sure because I don't have your book in front of me.) There are two verbs in the original sentence: "expects" and "to help." If the book asks you to convert the infinitive to the passive, then you need to change "to help" to "to be helped (by X)".

Note 1: "It is expected" is the proper way to make the passive form of "expect", but for whatever reason "It is expected by him" is rarely used. If you do use it, sounds better to my American ears to say "It is expected by him to be helped by me." However, the book answer is more natural at least in my northwestern American dialect.

Note 2: "It is expected that" is also very rarely used, and usually only in reference to a future event. If you do use a that-clause in this case you need to drop the "should" because it actually becomes a subjunctive construction: "It is expected by him that I help him." However, this should probably be avoided because this construction is so rarely seen.

2

"It is time for X" is simply the common idiom when the passive voice is used. Again, if you use that you need to drop the "should" and write "It is time that action be taken." However, it's far more common to see "it is time that" with a subject directly after, such as in "It is time that we take action." This wouldn't answer the book question correctly, though, since it asks for a passive construction.

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