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In this article on the changes in English grammar the author says:

How untrammelled the English passive is, may be seen in the fact that, not content with a construction like “A book was given him,” the language has devised “He was given a book.”

Can one really interchange the direct and indirect objects to get "Someone gave a book him" instead of "Someone gave him a book"? Does it sound informally, humorously or incorrectly?

tchrist
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se0808
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  • Someone gave a book to* him.* You need to add a preposition if the indirect object is after the direct object. – Peter Shor Jul 15 '15 at 10:54
  • Thank you, I understand it, but what did the author mean by this "He was given a book"? – se0808 Jul 15 '15 at 11:09
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    The author means that *both* the indirect object and the direct object can be the subject when using the passive voice. I gave John a book can turn into a book was given John (by me) *or* John was given a book (by me). – Peter Shor Jul 15 '15 at 11:10
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    The 'was given him' form predated and (formerly) was more frequent than the 'he was given' form. https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=(was+given+him)%2C(he+was+given)&year_start=1600&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2C%28was%20given%20him%29%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2C%28he%20was%20given%29%3B%2Cc0 – TimR Jul 15 '15 at 12:32
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    @Tim: both forms appear in the 16th century, whereas your Ngram only starts at 1600. You can't really conclude anything about which was first from that Ngram. – Peter Shor Jul 15 '15 at 20:49
  • By the way, here http://gameswithwords.org/ after a quiz it is said that Americans, Canadians, and South Africans accept I sent my mother a letter* instead of to my mother*. – se0808 Jul 23 '15 at 12:12
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    @se0808 - I think any variety of English accepts, "I sent my mother a letter". British English certainly does. What we do not say is, "I sent a letter my mother" Instead we must say "I sent a letter to my mother." – chasly - supports Monica Aug 03 '15 at 20:52
  • It's not that simple, but in many cases both orders are allowed. However, you have to be careful to get the prepositions and pronouns right. – John Lawler Oct 14 '15 at 02:13
  • See also Is it incorrect to say 'Give me it'?. – Edwin Ashworth Jul 13 '20 at 14:35

2 Answers2

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Someone gave a book him is incorrect, ungrammatical.

Jim Reynolds
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The sentence structure S-V-DO-IO

Someone-gave-a book-him.

has fallen out of favor, and we now expect the reverse positions of the direct and indirect objects:

Someone-gave-him-a book.

or that indirect object is replaced by the object of the preposition "to":

Someone-gave-a book-to him.

The Ngram viewer shows a steep drop in published uses of "gave it him" over the last two hundred years. But it wasn't always so. Here's some dialogue from All's Well That Ends Well.

KING     ... This ring, you say, was yours?
DIANA   Ay, my good lord.
KING     Where did you buy it? or who gave it you?
DIANA   It was not given me, nor I did not buy it.
KING     Who gave it you?
DIANA   It was not lent me neither.
KING     Where did you find it, then?
DIANA   I found it not.
KING     If it were yours by none of all these ways, how could you give it him?
DIANA   I never gave it him

deadrat
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