9.1 Sentences in contexts

Information is typically expressed in a sentence that consists of subject, verb and object (plus perhaps an adverb), e.g.:

Mary broke the vase. (La Mary va trencar la gerra.)

Mary broke the vase yesterday. (La Mary va trencar la gerra ahir.)

The corresponding question is:

Did Mary break the vase (yesterday)? (La Mary va trencar la gerra (ahir)?)

However, there are contexts which make it important to emphasise a particular element in the sentence, e.g.:

A: Is it true that Tom broke the vase? (És cert que en Tom va trencar la gerra?)

C: Was it last week that Mary broke the vase? (Va ser la setmana passada quan la Mary va trencar la gerra?) D: No, it was yesterday that Mary broke the vase. (No, var ser ahir quan la Mary va trencar la gerra.) D: No, it was yesterday that she broke it. (No, va ser ahir quan la va trencar.)

E: Mary broke the window, didn't she? (La Mary va trencar la finestra, oi?) F: No, what Mary broke was the vase. (No, el que la Mary va trencar va ser la gerra.)

Notice that we cannot use who in a similar way, e.g.:

G: Jack broke the window. (En Jack va trencar la finestra.)

But not:

H: No, who broke it was Mary.