does this phrase make sense?
"But it is the battle you will be the winner of."
I'm translating an article about mental health and battling with depression, does the phrase above sound natural to a native speaker? and if not - why?
Thank you!:)
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Answers · 6
3
I might change 'the battle' to 'a battle' if you are referring to overcoming depression and are using 'battle ' for the first time.
Hope this helps,
Richard
1
Hi Kate,
Let's put it this way: there are more natural and nice-sounding ways to phrase this idea. "But this is a battle you can win", "but you can be the winner in this battle", "it is possible for you to win this battle". The key thing is that these clauses I've suggested are more straightforward. They have whole prepositional phrases instead of a relative clause as an object of the sentence with a preposition that "dangles" there at the end, following a "dummy" passive voice subject "it".
It's fine to have one of those features in a sentence, but combining them really reduces clarity. The use of the passive voice also reduces clarity if it's possible to make the sentence more active and direct.
These suggested sentences have simpler, more straightforward structures. Demonstrative pronoun + copula + object relative clause with a modal verb, pronoun + modal passive + object + straight prepositional phrase with a clear object of its own.
0
It doesn't sound natural to me; sentences in English rarely end in a preposition like "of." Something like "But you will win the battle" would sound more natural. What is the context?
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