`7. Sentence Structure

`7. Sentence Structure

In Elizabethan 16th century England sentences were about 45 words long. In Victorian
England (19th century) they were about 30 words long. Modern sentences average 20
words or less. Shorter sentences are more dynamic and vigorous, but if all our sentences
were short, our speech would become boring, and thus less effective.
A typical sentence is a statement composed of subject (what we speak about) and
predicate (what we say about the subject).
The subject of the sentence is the thing we talk about with all its modifiers, e.g.:
The definition of experience is knowledge acquired too late.
The predicate is made up of the verb (expressing action performed or received by its
subject), together with all the words that go with that verb:
The definition of experience is knowledge acquired too late.
We have distinguish types of sentence structure:
 Simple: one subject, one predicate (See Appendix I): All great truths begin as
blasphemies.
 Compound: two or more simple sentences joined by a conjunction: You can twist
perceptions, but reality won‟t budge.
 Complex: one main clause plus subordinate modifying clauses: Everything you
can imagine is real.
 Compound-complex: at least two main clauses and one or more subordinate
clauses: I have kleptomania, but when it gets bad, I take something for it. Or:
Saina has the key that opens this cabinet, but she is not here today.

Varying our sentence structure makes our communication more effective, it helps keep
the interest of the receivers.
But however long or short the sentence, it should preferably express only one main idea –
several ideas jammed into one sentence make „decoding‟ and comprehension far more
difficult, e.g.:
Saying that, while he accepted medical evidence that asbestosis was associated
with the cause of death of a Washington chemical worker, John Henry Thompson,
aged 40, of 51 Pattenson Town, the Coroner, Mr. Williams, indicated at the
inquest at Chester-le-Street last night that the final decision whether the disease
caused or contributed to death would rest with the Pneumoconiosis Medical
Panel.
A useful way of determining optimal sentence length is to try speaking your sentence
aloud. If you can‟t manage it comfortably with one breath, then it needs „pruning.‟