What are the subject(s), verb(s), and object(s) of this sentence?

Question

But I hung on like death, such waltzing was not easy.

Answer 1

Erin, 

"But I hung on like death, such waltzing was not easy," is a beautiful sentence; I had to go read the poem in whole!

 

You're looking for the subject(s), verb(s) and object(s) it seems, so I will try to help you out.

 

Let's start with the VERB(s). Verbs are most often helping or action words, so we can look at the sentences to find the action words first. There are two different actions in this sentence: "hanging on" and "waltzing" (a type of dance). The verb "to hang" is in past tense as hung in this sentence. Waltzing is something that the narrator is doing at this point -- and it seems that it was a tough job. The reason "on" is not used is that it is a preposition; it is not part of the verb. There is a THIRD verb in this sentence; a helping verb is tucked in after waltzing. The word was is a form of the verb to be and must be counted in the verbs.

"But I hung on like death, such waltzing was not easy"

 

Now that we know what the actions are, we can find the SUBJECT(s) by asking the question Who is DOING the actions? We know that there is "hanging" on and "waltzing." Who is doing this waltzing? Our narrator - he refers to himself as "I" in this sentence. He is doing the hanging on (to his father) and he is doing the waltzing (a tough job). The subject of a sentence is the person or thing doing the action. The narrator "I" is the subject.

 

Thirdly, we look for OBJECT(s) in the sentence. Objects are receiving the action.

For example; I threw the ball" has a subject, object, and verb. The verb is "threw," "I" am the subject (the person doing the action), and the ball is receiving the throwing; it is the object. Not all sentences have an object receiving the action -- let's look at our sentence. I have crossed off the words that we know already.

"But I hung on like death, such waltzing was not easy."

Do any of the remaining words in the sentence receive the hanging on or the waltzing? If you're not quite sure, analyzing the words that are leftover will help. Let's make a list.

"But I hung on like death, such waltzing was not easy."

• But: but is a conjunction, so it cannot be an object.
• on: on is a preposition, we talked about that earlier; it can't be an object
• like: is, in this case, a preposition; it's being used to show "for example" or "similar to;" it cannot be an object
• death: is a noun. It's a thing; it could be an object if it were used in a different way in this sentence. Death is not receiving any actions -- it cannot be the object this time.
• such: can be used as an adjective, an adverb, or a pronoun. In this sentence, such is being used as an adjective; describing the waltzing. "Such" = this type ... this type of waltzing. It cannot be an object.
• not: is an adverb modifying the adjective easy ... it's not an object, so we have to cross that one out, too.
• easy: is an adjective (being modified by the word not) which means it's not an object.

 

This means we've gone through all the words in our sentence; we've found nothing that receives the actions presented... so that means there are no object(s) in this sentence.

 

I hope that helps!