why do we use "are" in this sentence?

Question

I am reading a book and I ran into an interesting sentence in which I cannot recognize the role of the verb in it. How is the use of 'are' justified here? Is it because "visits" can be the so-called subject of the sentence?

The source of his fear are the visits to his childhood home of a family lawyer.

@tchrist I agree, but it is a trap into which we fall so often that it has an authentic resonance. — WS2, Feb 02 '17 at 17:10
In some languages, such as Spanish and German, "are" would be correct. So one could speculate that the author of your book may have been influenced by another language. Hard to tell since you don't give us the author and title. — aparente001, Feb 03 '17 at 03:30
Does this answer your question? "There Is"/"There are" depends on plurality of the first list element or not? — niamulbengali, Dec 30 '20 at 12:22

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Feb 02 '17 at 17:16

3

We shouldn't use are there; that sentence is wrong.

The subject of the sentence is source, which is singular, and the verb should agree with that. Unfortunately, the author has fallen into the trap of making the verb agree with the noun that happens to be closest to the verb, and that noun is a plural.

answered Feb 02 '17 at 17:16

Hellion

59,365

I agree. The source of his fear is the visits; alternately written: the visits are the source of his fear. – Davo Feb 02 '17 at 17:29

why do we use "are" in this sentence?

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