Direct object

Deepening

The direct object is a complement without preposition (from where the qualifier of “direct”), which belongs to the verbal group.

Formally, it is an essential complement (nonsuppressible) and nonremovable in the sentence.

It is placed classically after the verb (“I write your name ” (Eluard) except particular stylistic effect (at Céline or Giono for example). It is placed in front of the verb when it is about a relative pronoun: “The eyes that one closes still see” Sully Prudhomme, of an interrogative pronoun (“ That we will make?), or in the case of personal pronouns which take a weak form then: “You take me along, I removes you” (Hugo). The same applies in pronominal turnings (considered or reciprocal) but with the requirement the personal pronoun is placed behind the verb with an indent of connection: “Natural, warmly the rocks” (Rimbaud).

Grammatical categories

- The direct object can be a name (a nominal group): “I often make this dream strange and penetrating ” (Verlaine)

- a pronoun: “As a distant sound that weakens the distance” (Lamartine)

- an infinitive: “I hoped for well to cry ” (Musset)

- a conjunctive proposal (called noun clause) “I know that on the wishes one does not have power ” (Molière)

- an infinitive proposal: “the summer laughs, and one sees on the edge of the sea Fleurir the blue thistle of sands ” (Hugo) (or an indirect interrogative proposal (“It requires which will come ” or an unspecified relative subordinate clause: “I will make what you will decide ”).

Remarks and problems

Ambiguity of the denomination:

By defining the C.O. D. like a complement of the transitive verb of action, with the active voice, the object on which its action is exerted, one confuses syntax and semantics. If it is true that, statistically, this kind additional often indicates the object on which the action is exerted, this bond between syntax and semantics can be only statistical. The definition has minimum would be thus to consider the direct object as a complement of the verb phrase which is not connected to the verb by a preposition, but this definition remains partial since there exist other complements without preposition. It is thus necessary to return to the complex concept of transitivity.

the concept of verb of action is not always operative and it is sometimes difficult to transpose the sentence to the passive voice; for example when it is a question of the verb of having: “It has two holes red at the right-sided” (Rimbaud) or with the prone pronoun “one”: “The eyes that one closes see still” (Sully Prudhomme), or at the time of lexiconized expressions as “It breathes health ”. Nevertheless the perception of a construction implying a verb with an active subject and a “object” remains in the approach of the function (the role) of the direct object, even if the syntactic criteria carry it in its definition.

Attention with confusions:

- the COD should not be confused with the attribute of the subject: this one is associated with verbs of state (to be - to appear - to remain…) and the same element indicates as the subject (example: “Pierre remains my friend”). He is also replaceable by a qualifying adjective (Pierre is friendly) what is impossible for the direct object.

- The only place after the verb associated with the absence with preposition is not enough with the identification to the COD: in the worms famous of Victor Hugo “I will walk the eyes fixed on my thoughts”, “the eyes fixed” although without preposition is a circumstantial complement in manner and not a COD. In the same way in “My pain, me the hand gives; come by here” from Baudelaire, “me” is a complement of object second, the COD being made up by “the hand”.

- the COD should not be either confused with complements of measurement (price - distance - duration - weights) which are also essential complements without preposition but, unlike the COD, they can be replaced by adverbs and the setting in the passive is impossible. Example: “This film cost million dollars/the war lasted hundred years…”

- Appearance is sometimes misleading: in spite of the presence of a preposition, there are well a COD in a case like this one: “Let us avoid suffering ”.

In addition play of the riddles with the questions “which? ” or “what? ” is to be proscribed imperatively. In addition to they do not bring any reflection on the syntactic relations between the words of the sentence, these questions can lead to coarse errors by confusion with placed after subjects, real subjects or attributes of the subject. Thus, in spite of the answers brought to the riddles, there is no COD in it worms of Rimbaud: “It is a hole of greenery where a river sings”!

Certains intransitive verbs can have in literary expressions an internal COD: “The maidservant in the large heart of which you were jealous // And who sleeps his sleep under a humble lawn…” (Baudelaire).

the direct object can also have an attribute to him (adjectival or name): Perhaps “the Americans will elect Hillary Clinton president”. (“president” is attribute of the COD “Hillary Clinton”).

Conclusion

Derived from the accusative Latin and passed by the case object (or objective case) of the Middle Ages, the direct object is a basic element of the syntax of the French language.

External bonds

http://www.espacefrancais.com/phrase_simple/complements_objet.html

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