Basic Clause PatternsHowever, nearly all of these verbs may have meanings other than BE or
BECOME. When they have those other meanings, they may not take a sub-
ject complement. In the following examples, the (a) clauses contain subject
complements, and the (b) clauses represent some other pattern.
(95) a. Hoolihan appeared weak.
b. Hoolihan appeared. (Pattern 1)
(96) a. Boris felt sorry.
b. Boris felt pain. (Pattern 2)
(97) a. Newton proved unreliable.
b. Newton proved the theorem. (Pattern 2)
(98) a. The milk turned sour.
b. Osgood turned away. (Pattern 1)We can use passivization to distinguish between VPs containing subject
complements and those containing direct objects. We can often passivize a
direct object (99) but never a subject complement (100).
(99) a. Einstein proved the theory.
b. The theory was proved by Einstein.
(100)a. Einstein proved the better physicist.
b. *The better physicist was proved by Einstein.Exercise
(a) Identify the (whole) subject complement in each of the following
clauses. (b) Using one appropriate criterion, prove that the phrase you
identified as the subject complement really is the subject complement.
(c) Draw both Reed/Kellogg and structural diagrams for each clause.
a. Elena grew tired.
b. The onions smelled sulphurous.
c. The anchovies tasted fishy and salty.
d. The sax sounded off-key.
Clause pattern 4: object complement
The object complement pattern may be viewed as a combination of pat-
tern 2, the basic transitive pattern, and pattern 3, the subject complement
pattern. Just as pattern 3 includes a subject complement, pattern 4 adds
a complement to its direct object. The functional formula for pattern 4 is