Pronouns as Subjects

Grammatical Agreement

AGREEMENT OF THE PREDICATE WITH THE SUBJECT

It means that the verb-predicate agrees with the subject in number and person.

Our only guide was the stars.

The stars were our only guide.

The verb-predicate is used in the singular if the subject is expressed by:

1. An infinitive or infinitives:

To labour in peace was all he sought.

To love and to be loved was his dream.

2. A clause:

How you persuaded them is beyond my understanding.

Where you found them does not concern us.

Note: If by two clauses, the plural predicate is used.

What I say and what I do are my own affair.

3. A numerical expression of arithmetic calculation (addition, subtraction, division):

Two and five is seven. Ten minus two is eight.

Twenty divided by five equals four.

Note: Multiplication presents an exception as the verb may be in the singular or in the plural.

Twice ten is/are twenty.

4. The word-group “many a + noun”:

Many a lie has been told.

5.With here - there constructions followed by subjects of different number, the verb-predicate agrees with the first subject:

Here is Tom and James.

There was a young woman and two children in the yard.

There were two children and a young woman in the yard.

6. Plural words and phrases count as singular if they are used as names, titles, quotations, etc.:

“Fathers and Sons” is the most popular of Turgenev’s novels.

“Senior Citizens” means people over sixty.

Note: The titles of some works which are collections of stories, etc., however, can be singular or plural:

The Canterbury Tales exist/exists in many manuscripts.

1. Indefinite pronouns (somebody, someone, anybody, something, anything); universal pronouns (everybody, everyone, everything, each); negative pronouns (nobody, no one, neither, etc.) have a singular predicate:

Everyone thinks he has the answer.

There was nothing to attract our attention.

Nobody has come except him.

However the negative pronoun none may have a singular or a plural verb-predicate, it depends whether one person is meant or more than one:

None of us understands/understand it.

2. Interrogative pronouns who, what have a singular verb-predicate:

Who is this man? What is there?

If the question refers to more than one person, a plural predicate may be used:

Who are with him? Who have agreed to act?

3. If the subject is expressed by a relative pronoun (who, which, that) the verb-predicate agrees with its antecedent:

It is I who am wrong. It is you who are wrong.

You are the one who is wrong. I don’t know the boys who live next door.

Shish Kebab is one of those dishes, which have to be cooked outdoors.

4. The universal pronoun both has a plural predicate:

Which of the books are yours? Both are mine.

5. The pronoun all in the sense “всё” has a singular verb, while all in the sense все has a plural verb:

All is well that ends well.

All were ready by that time.

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