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The one who gets first position, for him, there is a reward.

Is this a right sentence? I think it has an issue:

Because "The one" is already present so 'him' is additional. What does this refer to? If we write it like this:

There is a reward for him who...

Where will 'the one' go?

And if we write it this way:

There is a reward for the one who...

Where will 'him' go?

gotube
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xeesid
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    I'm sorry, but the first sentence doesn't make sense. I'm not really sure what you are trying to say here. Perhaps "There will be a reward for the winner" or "The winner will receive a reward" -- "the one who gets first position" sounds very strange and stilted. – Billy Kerr Jun 26 '22 at 14:18
  • Does this answer your question? [Is it correct English to write "John he is my husband," or, "Mary she went to the store?"](https://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/132899/is-it-correct-english-to-write-john-he-is-my-husband-or-mary-she-went-to-th) – MarcInManhattan Jun 26 '22 at 14:46

1 Answers1

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This is a sentence that has been broken up and rearranged for stylistic and rhetorical reasons. This process is called fronting

As you correctly infer, the un-fronted sentence would be something like:

There is a reward for him who gets first position

If I want to front the relative clause "...who gets first position" I need to add another noun to be relativised, I could use "one" or "person" :

The person who gets first postion, there is a reward for him.

In your actual sentence, the prepositional phrase "for him" has also been fronted.

So the noun "the one" has been added to make a noun phrase for fronting. It wouldn't be present in the unfronted sentence.

James K
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  • Yes. The sentence seems perfectly alright to me, except that I might use stronger punctuation after "position" i.e *The one who gets first position; for him, there is a reward.* Or if this seems overdoing it, then I would simply leave the comma after "position" and remove the one after "him". The important thing is to create a paused separation of the opening fronted clause - in my view. – WS2 Nov 30 '22 at 10:10