English grammar is a subject that is full of new concepts and ideas. Have you ever heard of the cleft sentences? Generally, a cleft is a basic construction of the sentences, where a part or phrase of a sentence is moved from its normal position to the separate clause. This is done in order to give greater emphasis to the sentence. This cleft is also known as the cleft sentence, cleft construction or also a cleft clause.
A cleft sentence can also be called the special structure which is used to emphasize particular words or phrases. Generally, in a clef sentence, you can put everything into a relative clause except the words which you wish to emphasize. You can see that these sentence structures can be very useful in writing and also very common in speech.
- There is more focus on one part as compared to another.
- Generally, the cleft sentence starts with “it”.
- This cleft sentence is followed by the verb phrase whose main verb is in “be” form.
- In a sentence, the focused part comes first.
- It is followed by the relative pronoun, relative determiner or sometimes the relative adverb.
For example, we can check the sentence,
- Maria felt a sharp pain in her stomach after dinner.
- It was just after dinner when Maria felt the sharp pain.
To understand the entire thing in a better way, let’s take another example.
Henry went to a horror movie yesterday.
Now if you want to understand how cleft sentences work, then have a look at the sentences given below.
- It was Henry to went to the horror movie yesterday.
- It was the horror movie that Henry went to yesterday.
- It was yesterday that Henry went to the movie.
Wh-Cleft and It-Cleft Sentences
In English grammar, you can come across different clefts constructions such as – “It-Cleft” and “Wh-Cleft”. These “wh-” clefts are often considered as “what” in the construction.
Let’s have a look at different examples of the It-Cleft and Wh-cleft.
- It was only last year that Maya decided to go back to her music school.
- It was John’s father who sent the employees out to proselyte.
- It was my brother who had the blue-ice eye and the beard of gold.
Now we can have look at the Wh-Clefts
- What I needed for the war was just a weapon.
- What I really wished for dad to come to the competition.
- What I expected from my brother was not to let me leave alone in the forest.
Cleft sentences with ‘all’
- All I’ve done today is to be annoying to my sister.
- All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth.
- What will you be having for dinner tonight? All I’ll be having for dinner is a pork chop.
- All you need is love.
Some more examples that will help you in understanding the concept of Cleft Sentences is:
Example 1:
- It was the government that increased taxes.
- It was the taxes that the government increased in the budget.
- It was last week that the government increased the taxes.
- It was in the budget that the government increased the taxes.
Example 2:
- Jeffery went to the supermarket on Sunday to buy some cheese.
- It was Sunday when Jeffery went to the supermarket to buy some cheese.
- The day when Jeffery went to the supermarket to buy some cheese was Sunday.
Conclusion:
You would mostly use the cleft sentences while speaking which is easy to connect and it is already understood to what is a new listener. If you are a beginner then make sure that you split the sentence properly and know which sentence needs more emphasis and which one needs less emphasis.