Impersonal style in English. Impersonal sentences that begin with It and There

In speech, we often use sentences like “Spring. It was getting dark. It’s getting colder,” etc. Such sentences are called “impersonal” because the sentence does not indicate the person performing the action, and often the action itself is missing. In Russian everything is simple, but in English with impersonal sentences - impersonal sentences are a little more complicated. English grammar does not allow sentences without a subject and predicate following one another in in strict order, and we can't translate Russian offer, consisting of one word, also one word. It is imperative to come up with a construction that will contain the main members of the sentence. We'll see now how it will look in English.

Impersonal sentence structure

Let's start with a simple one and gradually complicate the impersonal sentence. "Spring. It was getting dark. It's getting colder." As can be seen from the examples, this type of sentence is used to convey natural conditions or weather phenomena. The construction used to translate impersonal sentences is based on English - in the present, past or future tense. As you probably guessed, to be will serve as the missing predicate, and as for the subject, a pronoun will take its place it, which always and in any impersonal sentence will serve as the subject and, accordingly, take its rightful place at the beginning of the sentence. Now let's see what we got.

Spring – It is spring
Cold – It is cold
Warmth – It is warm
Hot – It is hot
It was getting dark – It was getting dark
It was getting cold – It was getting cold
Winter will come soon - It will be winter soon
It will be hot in summer - It will be hot in summer

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As can be seen from the above examples, we have created a non-existent formal subject it, and the formal predicate is, was or will be depending on the tense. By design it is, it was, it will be we will translate into English all sentences that contain the adverb - difficult, perhaps, impossible, easy, late, early, far, close etc. To make it easier for you to understand, we will give a few examples:

It is difficult for a child to lift a heavy box – It is difficult for the child to lift the heavy box
It is impossible to finish this work in a day
It is difficult for me to breathe - it is difficult for me to breathe
It's too early to get up now - it is too early to get up
It’s too late to go for a walk – it is late to go for a walk

For education interrogative form impersonal offer auxiliary to be (am, is, are) is placed at the beginning of the sentence, and the negative is formed using negative particle not.

Is it dark out of doors?
It was not snowing.

Use of impersonal sentences

We use an impersonal sentence to say what time is it now :
It’s 11 o’clock now – it is 11 o’clock now
It was half past five – it was half past 4
When I return it will be 10 o’clock already
Impersonal offers always used to describe weather with verbs to rain, to snow, to hail, to drizzle
Often in autumn it's raining– It often rains in autumn
It’s drizzling, I must take an umbrella – It is drizzling, I must take an umbrella
To note how much time it takes us to complete an action, you’ve probably come across sentences starting with the words “ I need... time to do something, it takes me... time to do something, etc. " So, to translate such sentences, the construction of an impersonal sentence is also used - It takes…to…:
She needs an hour to get to work – It takes her an hour to get to her work
It will take my mother half a day to bake so many cakes.

An impersonal sentence is often used to describe actions that require an infinitive, using words such as never, to appear, to seem, to turn out, to happen
It is never late to say “excuse me” - It’s never too late to say “sorry”
It seemed to be late to change anything - It seemed too late to change anything
An impersonal sentence is used to express modality with verbs can, may, must . In this case the formal subject is the word one, which is omitted when translated into Russian.
One must not smoke here
One should wash hands before having meals
It is impossible to do all the work at once - One cannot do all the work at once.

That's all about impersonal sentences in English language. Try to form several sentences on your own to reinforce the material.

Studying foreign language- enough difficult process, requiring concentration, a lot of time and regular practice. This is important if you want to become fluent in the language at a conversational level. Learn to collect famous words in one sentence it may seem very simple, but this is only at first glance. This is especially noticeable for those who study on their own. To do this, we advise you to understand the classification of structures.

If we talk about the types of sentences based on the subject, they are divided into:

personal;
vaguely personal;
impersonal.

In our article we will dwell in more detail on impersonal sentences: we will explain why they are used, when they are appropriate or necessary, and consider the features of construction and types.

Impersonal constructions – this topic is one of the most important in English grammar. Proposals of this type are widespread. Their peculiarity lies in the absence of indication of the person who performs the action. If we talk about the Russian language, the following constructions can serve as an example: “Winter. It was getting dark. It's getting colder." Distinctive feature, with the help of which impersonal sentences are defined - it consists of only one word, which is the subject or predicate.

Unlike ours native language, in English they are constructed differently, corresponding certain rules. Constructions without the main members of the sentence are not allowed here and will be perceived by foreigners as a set of unrelated words. In order for the text to carry a semantic load, it is important to follow the rules of word order. When the subject comes first and the predicate comes after it, it will be an affirmative sentence. When asking a question, the reverse word order is used: the predicate, and then the subject. Therefore, when writing or in colloquial speech set your priorities correctly. First of all, find the main members of the sentence, and only then add secondary words.

So, where to start to get it right? The pronoun it and the verb to be (sometimes other verbs are used) - here keywords, which create the basis grammatical construction impersonal. The phrase is built according to the principle direct order. At the same time, it is not translated in any way.

What are impersonal sentences used for?

You cannot learn something without understanding why it is needed. Here is a classification of cases in which you cannot do without impersonal structures. These include:

· Description of natural phenomena:

It is light. – It’s light.
It is held. - Cold.

· Weather description:

It is rainy. - It is rainy.

More complex sentences are often used in English:
It is snowing for the whole night. – It is snowing all night long.
It often rains in autumn. - It often rains in autumn.

· Answering the question: “What time is it?”:

It is 6.30 p.m. - It's half past six now.

· Indicating time and distance:

It is 9 o’clock - It’s 9 o’clock now.
It is close from here. - Close to here.
When we reach the peninsula, it will be 1 p.m. – When we reach the peninsula, it will already be one in the morning.

· Translation of adverbs: difficult, easy, possible, early, late, far:

It is late to go to the store. - It's too late to go to the store.
It is easy to do sit-ups. – It’s easy to do squats.

· Indicating the amount of time required to complete an action:

It takes me 40 minutes to go to school. – The journey to school takes me 40 minutes.
It will take him 2 hours to repair his the car. - He will need 2 hours to fix the car.

· With the verbs believe, know, understand, expect, say, report, think, consider, used in passive voice:.

It is believed that the author’s cakes are difficult to prepare. – It is believed that designer cakes are difficult to prepare.
She is expected to leave soon. “She is expected to leave soon.”

To create an interrogative sentence, you need to swap the pronoun and verb.

For example: Is it interested for you to watch a movie? – Are you interested in watching the film?

To build negative construction, use the particle not by adding it to the verb to be: It is not complicated to swim brace. - Swimming breaststroke is difficult.

Now that you are familiar with impersonal constructions, we suggest you consolidate the material you have covered yourself. Make up phrases using your lexicon. You can try to write short story with minimal inclusion of pronouns. For the first time, we recommend taking a simple topic, for example, “Seasons.” Don't forget that competent text creation is the foundation of spoken English. This is why it is important to pay Special attention rules for forming sentences and not to ignore questions that arise during lessons.

In Russian, we can easily construct sentences consisting of one word: “It’s cold. Hot. Difficult. Late".

But how to do this in English?

After all, English has its own word order, and the sentence must have a main character.

Therefore, according to the rules of the English language, we cannot translate these sentences “in Russian” in one word: “Cold. Hot. Difficult. Late."

To build them there is a special construction It is, which I will tell you about in this article.

From the article you will learn:

How to construct impersonal sentences in English

What are impersonal sentences?

Impersonal sentences are those sentences in which no main thing actor . Let's look at this with an example.

We use impersonal offers:

1. To describe weather and natural phenomena
For example: It's cold. Dark.

2. To indicate time, date, day of the week, etc.
For example: 6 hours. Monday.

3. To indicate distance
For example: Far. Close.

4. To express the speaker's opinion
For example: Fun. Difficult.

Attention: Confused about English rules? Find out how to easily understand English grammar.

To construct such sentences in English, you need to use construction it is.

Let's look at it in detail.

Rules for the formation of impersonal sentences in English

Such sentences are formed very simply: using the pronoun it and the verb to be at the right time. Offer outline:

It + verb to be + other parts of the sentence

It does not indicate a person and is not translated into Russian, but in the formation of a sentence it takes on the role of the main character.

Verb to be - special kind verb. We use it when we say that someone:

Located somewhere (He's in the park)
Is someone (She's a nurse)
Is somehow (Gray cat)

Depending on the tense in which we use this verb, in combination with the pronoun it, it changes its form:

In present time Present Simple- It is...= It’s….

It is hot.
Hot.

It is 5 o'clock.
5 o'clock.

In the past time Past Simple- It was...

Itwas dark.
It was dark.

It was easy.
It was easy.

In the future tense Future Simple - Itwill be…

It will be difficult.
It will be hard.

It will be fun.
It will be fun.

Negation in impersonal sentences in English

Sometimes we need to say negative sentences: "Not difficult. Not windy. Not far." To form such sentences, we need to add a negative particle not to the verb to be.

The outline of such a proposal:

It + verb to be + not + other parts of the sentence

We can construct such negative sentences in the present, past, and future tenses.

In the present tense Present Simple - It is not…= It’s not...

It's not important.
Doesn't matter.

It’ snot cold.
Not cold.

In the past tense Past Simple - Itwasnot…

It wasn't funny.
It wasn't funny.

It wasn't dark.
It wasn't dark.

INfuturetimeFuture Simple - It will not be… = It won’t be…

Will it be windy?
Will it be windy?

So now you know what impersonal sentences are. Let's get to practice.

Reinforcement task with the It is structure

Translate the following sentences into English. Leave your answers in the comments:

1. Friday.
2. It will be difficult.
3. Was it interesting?
4. 6 hours.
5. Not far.
6. Will it be fun?

We all remember the immortal lines of the poem: “Night. Street. Flashlight. Pharmacy." I wonder if anyone has thought about translating these words? Maybe, "Night. Street. Streetlight. Drugstore?"

In fact, such a translation will not be entirely correct. We remember Golden Rule In English there are no sentences without a verb. And in our translation, it turns out, it happens. What to do when there is no verb? Many people don’t bother for long and translate Russian thought word by word into English without thinking about grammar. It is then that we deal with the so-called Russian-English language. It is precisely such “actions” that reveal both the origin of the user and his, unfortunately, low level of language knowledge.

The situation with the formal absence of a verb is resolved as follows:

If there is no doer (subject) and action (predicate), then we are dealing with an impersonal sentence. An impersonal sentence is a sentence that conveys a state, not an action, and does not have a person to whom this state is characteristic.

In Russian, we often encounter such sentences: “It’s cold outside,” “It’s five o’clock,” “Today is Thursday.” Please note that all these sentences convey a certain state - weather and temporary. In addition, we will not be able to answer the question “Who does this?” and identify the subject. Therefore we are dealing with impersonal sentences.

There is another little trick on how to find the “missing” verb and thereby recognize an impersonal sentence. Put it in the past tense: “Cold” - “It was cold.” Here is our verb that surfaced! This means that it exists and we need to use the impersonal sentence structure for translation.

In English, these sentences are constructed according to the scheme It + be at the right time . In accordance with this scheme, our examples will be translated as follows:

It is cold outside.
It is five o'clock now.
It is Thursday today.

In general, there are generalized semantic categories of sentences, which are most often impersonal.

Table. Impersonal sentences in English

Category	Example
	It's 4 p.m. It's 3 o'clock. It's half past nine.
	It's windy. It's cloudy.
Distance	It’s 5 kilometers to my country house.

However, the scheme It + be in the right tense works only if it is followed by nominal parts of speech: nouns, adjectives, adverbs, numerals. Please note that in all our examples this rule is followed. But what about, for example, such options as “Burns”, “Hurts”, etc.?

IN recent examples we have reverse situation: there is a verb, but no action producer. Then you just need to put the impersonal pronoun it before this verb.

It stings
It hurts

The fact is that it is the pronoun it (it) and gives impersonality to sentences, while maintaining the normal word order - subject, predicate and other members of the sentence.

Impersonal constructions ( Impersonal constructions) in English are a fairly common way of constructing sentences. In these sentences we do not indicate the person performing the action. It remains behind the scenes because there is no information about it, or we simply don’t care who performs the action. In Russian, such sentences are organized very simply: “Autumn. Twilight. It's getting colder." These words are impersonal sentences consisting of just one subject or one predicate.

In the English language, we build impersonal sentences on a different principle, because the rules of grammar do not allow such free use of the main members of the sentence as in the Russian language. And a sentence in which there is no subject or predicate is generally considered grammatically incorrect and is translated into Russian in the style of “You don’t understand mine.”

The thing is that the order of words in the English language is fixed, and it is this that makes the sentence meaningful. For affirmative proposals Direct word order is typical, that is, the subject comes first, then the predicate. Interrogative sentences have reverse order words, that is, we first put the predicate, and then the subject. Therefore, when we build a sentence in English, first of all we find those words that take the place of the subject and predicate, and then we put in whatever we want.

Don't forget to check out our article "".

In cases where the subject is not found in any way, we use the impersonal pronoun it. It does not indicate the face and is not translated into Russian, but it holds the entire structure English sentences, working, of course, in tandem with the predicate. In most cases, the predicate in such sentences is the verb to be in present, past or future tense. By filling in the subject and predicate positions using it And to be, we followed the rule of direct word order according to the principle: we put a formal subject it and predicate - verb to be or another verb. Essentially, we have created a grammatically correct sentence.

Such impersonal sentences in English are used in the following cases:

To describe natural phenomena.
It is dark. - It's dark.
To describe the state of the weather.
It is windy. - It's windy.

At the same time, often impersonal constructions are built with verbs to rain, to snow, to hail, to drizzle.

It was raining for the whole day yesterday. – It rained all day yesterday.

It often snows in winter. - It's snowing frequently in the winter.
To answer the question: “What time is it?”
It is 8.20 p.m. – It’s 8:20 now.
To indicate time and distance.
It is 8 a.m. - It's 8 o'clock now.

It is far away from here. - Far away from here.

When we reach the city, it will be 2 a.m.. - When we reach the city, it will already be it will be 2 am.
To translate adverbs: perhaps, difficult, late, easy, early, far.
It is late for the child to go for a walk. - To kid late to go for a walk.

It is easy for me to study English. - To me easily learn English language.

It is very far for us to walk there. - There very far go.
To indicate the amount of time it takes to complete an action. Here we use the construction It takes... to... (corresponds to Russian: “I need... time to do something”; “it takes me... time to...").
It takes me about an hour to do my morning exercise. – It takes me about an hour to exercise in the morning.

It will take her 20 min. to do her make-up. – She will need 20 minutes to apply makeup.
With verbs in the passive voice: believe, understand, say, know, report, expect, think, consider.
It is believed that English is easy to study. – It is believed that English is easy to learn.

It is expected that he will arrive soon. - He is expected to arrive soon.

It is reported that the election was a success. – They report that the elections were successful.

The interrogative form of an impersonal sentence in English is formed by changing the places of the main members of the sentence. Verb to be put in first place, and the pronoun it- on the second.

Is it easy for you to speak English? – Is it easy for you to speak English?

The negative form of impersonal sentences is formed using a negative particle not, which is added to the verb form to be.

It is not difficult to play tennis. – Tennis is not difficult to play.

Be sure to use these wonderful designs! They will help you dive into the deep structure of the English language and understand the mentality of the British.

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Impersonal sentences in English