The subject of this book is 19th-century heroes...
OR
The subject of this book are 19th-century heroes...
WHICH IS CORRECT?
If you turn the sentence round then I'm pretty certain that "19th-c. heroes are the subject of this book" is correct but does that have any bearing if you turn it round? In some inflected languages, see, they have the instrumental to sort this one out (the "real subject" - heroes here - are in the nominative and stay that way wherever you put them in the sentence, while their descriptor ("the subject of this book") goes in the instrumental or equiv. case).
So in my book (haha) it should be "are" but I've just been pulled up on it and want to check.
Ta, pedants dearies.
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I'm stumped again, please help asap
6 replies
jessia · 31/03/2008 12:05
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