2. What is a transitive verb?
Verbs which always have a complement
when in active voice, and which have
passive forms, are transitive verbs.
Their most characteristic formal feature is
that when a passive form is substituted for
an active form, the complement or a part of
it must be made the subject if the meaning
is to be preserved without significant
change.
3. A transitive verb has two
characteristics:
1. First, it is an action verb, expressing a
doable activity like kick, want, paint,
write, eat, clean, etc.
2. Second, it must have a direct object,
something or someone who receives the
action of the verb.
4. Thus, in structures like the
following two:
The man sold his car.
The wind blew down the house.
The transitive active forms sold and blew
down may be replaced by was sold and was
blown down, requiring that the complements
his car and the house be shifted to subject:
5. The car was sold (by the man)
The house was blown down (by the
wind)
Many transitive verbs have homonyms
which are intransitive or linking. It is
therefore necessary to observe a verb in a
grammatical context before it can be
classified.
Depending on the type of object they take,
verbs may be transitive, intransitive,
or linking.
6. Thus, verbs such as turn, blow and
sound can belong to all three
classes:
Linking:
The weather is cold.
The wind blew a gale.
The music sounded loud.
Intransitive:
The earth turns.
The wind is blowing.
The fire alarm sounded.
Transitive:
The car turned the corner.
The musician blew the trumpet.
The watchman sounds the alarm.
7. The formal distinctions between
these three types of verbs may
be summarized as follows:
(1)Linking Verb: has complement but no
passive
(2)Intransitive Verb: has neither complement
nor passive;
(3)Transitive Verb: has both complement
and passive.
8. Since intransitive verbs have no
complements, they do not appear in
structures of complementation.
Each of the other two types has its own
kind of complement.
Complements appearing with linking verbs
are called subjective complements;
complements appearing with transitive
verbs are called objects.
9. Here are some examples of
transitive verbs:
Sylvia kicked Juan under the table.
kicked = transitive verb; Juan = direct object
Rose is painting the kitchen walls.
Here the verb is painting and the subject is Rose.
If we form the question - what is Rose painting?
The answer is- The kitchen walls.
Thus, we see that there was a specific
object on which the action of painting
was being done.
10. Hannah gave him a big hug.
Here we see that the action ‘gave’ is being
performed by the subject Hannah. So the
question is what did Hannah give? And the
answer is - A big hug.
Here, we also have a indirect object as ‘him’. This
indirect object would be the answer to the
questionWho did the subject (Hannah) -verb- (give) the
object (hug) to?
11. What is a direct object?
When the complement of a transitive verb
consists of a single object, whether it be
single word or a complex structure, this
object is called a direct object. Pronoun
objects are in the objective case.
12. Some examples of single-word direct objects
are the following:
Noun:
He found a friend.
Pronoun: I saw him.
Function Noun: We sent several.
Verb (Infinitive): They want to go.
(Present Participle): She likes walking.
13. Some dialects, notably those of the
Midland (Pennsylvania and derivative
settlements) use certain adverbs as direct
object, especially with the verb want, as in
the cat wants out, the passenger wants off.
As we might expect, various complex
structures also may function as direct
objects, as in the following illustrations:
14. (a) Structures of Modification
We saw an excellent new play about Mexico.
She likes walking alone in the rain.
(b) Structures of Coordination
The party needs a new platform and a new leader.
The company plans both to find new deposits and
to mine them.
16. (d) Structures of Predication
The teacher had the students read a book.
The hot weather caused us to feel sluggish.
I know he is here.
I wonder where he is.
17. References
Francis, Nelson
MacFadyen, Heather “The Writing Centre
Hyper Grammar” (Using Verbs),University of
Ottawa, Last updated: 2008.10.10
http://www.englishleap.com
