Transformation notes

Voice is the form that shows whether the subject does the action or receives it. In the active voice the subject is the doer: “The student writes a letter.” In the passive the subject is the receiver: “A letter is written by the student.” Thomson–Martinet’s formula is: object of the active → subject of the passive; a form of be that matches the tense; the past participle (V3); by + the old subject if the doer still matters. “Someone stole the book” → “The book was stolen.” The doer can drop when it is unknown, obvious, or unimportant.

Tense of be follows the active verb. Present simple: writes → is/are written. Present continuous: is writing → is being written. Present perfect: has written → has been written. Past simple: wrote → was/were written. Past continuous: was writing → was being written. Past perfect: had written → had been written. Future simple: will write → will be written. Future perfect: will have written → will have been written. Modals: can write → can be written; must write → must be written. Present, past and future perfect continuous, and future continuous, are rarely made passive; those forms are clumsy in English.

Questions invert the first auxiliary: “Does she write a letter?” → “Is a letter written by her?” Imperatives: “Open the door.” → “Let the door be opened.” A polite request: “Please open the door.” → “You are requested to open the door.” Two objects give two passives: “She gave him a pen” → “He was given a pen” / “A pen was given to him.” The person as new subject is the more natural of the two. Intransitive verbs have no object, so they have no passive: “She sleeps” stays active. SVC sentences with be are not turned into passive: “She is a teacher” is not “A teacher is been by her.”

Change pronouns with the new roles: she writes it → it is written by her (old subject she becomes her after by; old object it becomes the new subject). Keep the same tense family. Do not add a doer the active never named. Meaning must stay: if the active is a habit, the passive is still a habit.

Direct speech quotes the speaker’s exact words inside inverted commas. Indirect (reported) speech reports those words as a clause, without commas of quotation. “She said, ‘I am tired.’” → “She said that she was tired.” Thomson–Martinet and Murphy move four things: the reporting verb, the conjunction, the pronouns, and — when the reporting verb is past — the tense. Said to + object becomes told + object. Said without an object can stay said. Statements take that (it may be dropped in easy English). Questions take asked and if/whether or the wh-word. Commands take told / ordered / requested + to-infinitive.

When the reporting verb is past, tenses step back one: present simple → past simple; present continuous → past continuous; present perfect / past simple → past perfect; will → would; can → could; may → might; must → had to (or must, if a lasting rule). “She said, ‘I write.’” → “She said that she wrote.” “She said, ‘I will come.’” → “She said that she would come.” No back-shift when the fact is still true or always true: “The teacher said, ‘Water boils at 100°C.’” → “The teacher said that water boils at 100°C.” Pronouns turn from the speaker’s I/you to the reporter’s he/she/they. Place and time words move with the past reporting verb: now → then; today → that day; yesterday → the previous day / the day before; tomorrow → the next day / the following day; here → there; this → that; ago → before.

Yes–no questions: “She said, ‘Are you ready?’” → “She asked if/whether I was ready.” The reported clause uses statement order: subject before the verb, no do if the tense no longer needs it. Wh-questions keep the wh-word: “She said, ‘Where do you live?’” → “She asked where I lived.” Commands: “She said to him, ‘Open the door.’” → “She told him to open the door.” Negative: “Don’t wait.” → “She told me not to wait.” Requests with please take requested or asked. Exclamations: “She said, ‘What a hot day!’” → “She exclaimed that it was a very hot day.”

Put the reporting verb in a past or present that fits the situation. If the reporting verb is present (“She says”), tenses inside usually stay. Do not leave the inverted commas in the indirect sentence. Do not change a question into a statement meaning: “She asked where I lived” is still a reported question, even without a question mark.

Bhatnagar and Thomson–Martinet sort sentences by how many finite clauses they hold. A simple sentence has one finite verb: “She opened the door.” It may still hold phrases, infinitives and participles — “Hearing the news, she wept” is simple, because hearing is not finite. A compound sentence joins two or more independent clauses of the same rank with a coordinating conjunction: and, but, or, nor, yet, so — “She heard the news and she wept.” A complex sentence has one main clause and at least one subordinate clause, opened by because, if, when, although, that, who, which, unless — “When she heard the news, she wept.”

Simple → compound: add a coordinator and a second finite verb. “She is poor. She is honest.” → “She is poor but she is honest.” “She finished the work. She went home.” → “She finished the work and she went home.” Simple → complex: turn one idea into a subordinate clause. “She is poor. She is honest.” → “Although she is poor, she is honest.” “Hearing the news, she wept.” → “When she heard the news, she wept.” “I know his name.” → “I know what his name is.” A relative clause also makes complex: “I met the teacher. She teaches English.” → “I met the teacher who teaches English.”

Compound → complex: change the coordinator into a subordinator. “She was tired but she finished the work.” → “Although she was tired, she finished the work.” “He was ill so he stayed at home.” → “Because he was ill, he stayed at home.” Complex → simple (when the paper asks the reverse): use a participle, an infinitive, or a phrase — “When she heard the news, she wept” → “Hearing the news, she wept.” “She hoped that she would pass” → “She hoped to pass.” Meaning must not gain a new cause or lose the contrast of but / although.

Count finite verbs to name the type. Two finite verbs joined by and/but/or/so = compound. A when/because/who clause hanging on a main clause = complex. One finite verb = simple, even if the sentence is long. Do not call a simple sentence compound because it has two nouns, and do not call a complex sentence compound because it is long.

A declarative sentence states: “She writes a letter.” Negative denies: “She does not write a letter.” Interrogative asks: “Does she write a letter?” Thomson–Martinet and Murphy move these three with the auxiliary. If the declarative already has an auxiliary (be, have, do, will, can, must…), put not after that auxiliary for the negative, and bring the auxiliary before the subject for a yes–no question. “She is ready.” → “She is not ready.” → “Is she ready?” “She can swim.” → “She cannot swim.” → “Can she swim?”

If there is no auxiliary, English inserts do / does / did. Present simple: “She writes.” → “She does not write.” → “Does she write?” (the main verb returns to the base form write). Past simple: “She wrote.” → “She did not write.” → “Did she write?” Be as a main verb does not take do: “She is a teacher.” → “She is not a teacher.” → “Is she a teacher?” In a negative, some often becomes any, already becomes yet: “She has some paper.” → “She does not have any paper.” Words that are already negative do not take a second not: never, nobody, nothing, no — “She never writes,” not “She does not never write.”

Wh-interrogative: put the wh-word first, then the auxiliary, then the subject, then the rest. “She lives in Bikaner.” → “Where does she live?” “She bought a book.” → “What did she buy?” The wh-word that is itself the subject does not invert: “Who wrote this?” (not “Did who write this?”). Negative interrogative: “Does she not write?” / “Doesn’t she write?” — a question that expects a yes, or that shows surprise.

Keep the tense family and the person. Do not change a declarative of fact into a different meaning: the negative of “She wrote yesterday” is “She did not write yesterday,” not “She has not written.” A yes–no question of “She will come” is “Will she come?” — will already does the work of do.