Example sentences of "this [was/were] a " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | If this were a list of localities where an industrial plant unleashed disaster on the folks next door , that would be bad enough . |
| 2 | If this were a simple conflict between attack and escape , it would have led to threat displays . |
| 3 | If this were a story by a ‘ serious ’ writer the critics would pursue the symbolism of hidden latches and dark tunnels as diligently as the children pursue the gang of international smugglers discovered in the cave at the end of the tunnel . |
| 4 | If this were a study in local history we should now , of course , be looking ever more closely at the ups and downs of everyday life in Frome . |
| 5 | He came forward from behind his desk and held out his hand as if this were a first meeting . |
| 6 | I must begin with a coincidence which I would not dare to recount if this were a work of fiction . |
| 7 | It was a soft , slow moaning , punctuated with sharp little sounds like cries ; the earth grieving in a whisper , but in some weird way with a purpose as if this were a language , a communication . |
| 8 | How , if this were a complete picture of the League 's activities , did it survive at all ? |
| 9 | Specifically , we are presented with a rather bland , urban or suburban , middle-class model of family living as if this were a model of or for society as a whole . |
| 10 | He spoke as if this were a perfectly natural thing to do Carrie thought of it , of the sick old woman dressing up in her jewels and her beautiful clothes , and of this skinny , solemn , bespectacled boy watching her , and it did n't seem natural at all . |
| 11 | He certainly would be if this were a movie . |
| 12 | Sometimes he could feel as if this were a frontier post , with everything out there just waiting and passing time until the opportunity came to grab the territory back . |
| 13 | She seemed to regret its disappearance and looked at the chalk outline marked by Massingham on the floor as if this were a poor substitute for the real thing . |
| 14 | I feel , she thought , as though we are besieged here , as though this were a fortress , and the whole world outside were one enormous enemy , ready to slide through the gates and the thickets of rhododendron and into our front door if we leave it open even a little . |
| 15 | If this were a musical , she thought irrelevantly , there 'd be a song about now . |
| 16 | And this were a er field p his regiment with his regiment on , and he wrote his name on and where he came from . |
| 17 | If this were a simple and one-way movement , the answer would lie in ensuring that the record of achievement is up to date and intelligible , that assessment records are accurate and that the pastoral record , if any , is both just and constructive . |
| 18 | as if this were a signal , the entire barrage magnified and intensified itself . |
| 19 | If this were a respite it was a shortlived one . |
| 20 | Scott J concluded that if this were a case in which there was any question or threat of general disclosure by the defendant of confidential information concerning the way in which the plaintiff carried on its business or concerning any details of the affairs of any of its clients there would be no answer to the claim for an injunction ; but it was not general disclosure that the defendant had in mind . |
| 21 | If this were a serious move to protect the environment from fuel pollution , then the Government would have been rather more convincing were it to use the new VAT revenue for a national programme of home insulation . |
| 22 | No , no , not that one , Doug , this were a big woman , were n't she ? |
| 23 | It might be thought that this was a natural consequence of the popularity of great artists , but in fact the economics of publishing result in some bizarre decisions about art books . |
| 24 | But this was a drama , the story of the circumstances of Van Gogh 's life ; ‘ No attempt has been made , ’ wrote Meier-Graefe , ‘ to make a critical analysis of the pictures , which enter upon the scene only in so far as they concern the drama directly or indirectly . ’ |
| 25 | This was none of your mensa-a-table , this was a flash from the forbidden planet , and it was everywhere . |
| 26 | However , this was a fairly necessary compromise : paragraph 2 had already conferred on the Roman catholic church a ‘ special position ’ in the state , on the grounds that the church was ‘ the guardian of the Faith professed by the great majority of its citizens ’ . |
| 27 | This was a case of Gentlemen versus Players in the golden age when such distinctions still applied and when it was obvious to anyone with an eighth of an intelligence that no paid journeyman could ever begin to compare with the rapier-like ‘ amateurs ’ who flitted with effortless superiority , solving one crime after another with a brilliant insouciance which was the dismay of the criminal fraternity , the envy of the constabulary , and a source of immense satisfaction to most of the upper middle class , especially those with an aptitude for the Times crossword . |
| 28 | In effect this was a period of withdrawal from a rigidly structured police world to a world turned upside down ; where , in a ‘ counter-cultural ’ way , we were to find that the strict terms of reference we had carefully built up over the years no longer seemed to have relevance . |
| 29 | In effect this was a time when new worlds and new social structures were being forged ; and in many ways we were closer to the world of the underground than that of the moral majority , for we were walking the same ground and like many in the alternative society were ( somewhat unsystematically ) following an essential and perennial theme of history — that of man 's journey as ‘ hero ’ . |
| 30 | No — stop — this was a cancer of mistrust , spreading through him , eating him . |