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§ 16. Both general and pronominal questions may serve as rhetorical questions. A rhetorical
question contains a statement disguised as a question. Usually it is a positive question hiding a negative
statement. No answer is expected.
Can any one say what truth is? (No one can say what it is.)
Do we always act as we ought to? (We do not always act as we ought to.)
What else could I do? (I could do nothing.)
Who would have thought to meet you here? (Nobody would.)
In their form and intonation rhetorical questions do not differ from standard question types. The difference
lies in their communicative aim. A rhetorical question does not ask for any new information. It implies a
statement and is always emotionally coloured. Besides, it is employed to attract the listener's attention. Since
rhetorical questions do not require an answer, they are not followed by a response. The speaker may give an
answer himself to clarify his idea. Rhetorical questions are employed in monological speech, especially in
oratory, and poetry in the writer’s digressions.
To me what is wealth? - it may pass in an hour.
If tyrants prevail, or if Fortune should frown:
To me what is title? - the phantom of power;
To me what is fashion ? - I seek but renown. (Byron)
And what, after all, can it be other than modesty that makes him [Roy Kear] even now write to the reviewers
of his books, thanking them for their praise and ask them for luncheon? (Maugham)
Rhetorical questions occur in colloquial English too, as in this fragment of dialogue:
Will you give me a picture of yours? - What for?... I’m not Marilyn Monroe or Jane Mansfield.
Imperative sentences
§ 17. Imperative sentences express commands which convey the desire of the speaker to make
someone, generally the listener, perform an action. Besides commands proper, imperative sentences may
express prohibition, a request, an invitation, a warning, persuasion, etc., depending on the situation, context,
wording, or intonation.
Stand up! Sit down. Open your textbooks.
Be quick!
Formally commands are marked by the predicate verb in the imperative mood (positive or negative), the
reference to the second person, lack of subject, and the use of the auxiliary do in negative or emphatic sentences
with the verb to be.
Commands are generally characterized by the falling tone, although the rising tone may be used to make a
command less abrupt. In writing commands are marked by a full stop or an exclamation mark.
A negative command usually expresses prohibition, warning or persuasion.
Don’t cross the street before the light turns to green.
Don’t allow children to play with matches.
Don’t worry.
Commands can be softened and made into requests with the help of the word please, the rising tone, a tag
question or a “yes-no” question beginning with will or would.
Speak louder, please.
Repeat the last word, will you?