Thursday, December 7, 2017

past participle - Is "put" imperative in this sentence?



In a writing exercise I sent to my English teacher, she wrote some comments evaluating my writing. Some comments were about what I did, and others were about what I should do. In the sentences about what I should do she used the Imperative form. But, one of the sentences was this one:





Put a touch of personal feeling in
your conclusion.




The problem is that the word "Put" can be Preterit, Past Participle or Present Participle. So, how can I know if "Put" was used as a Preterit or to build an Imperative clause?


Answer



It has to be an imperative; if it were preterit, it would have a subject (“You put a touch of …”).


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