Question

Choose the sentence in which the usual order of words is altered: [Advanced]

• A. The people were excited when Superman made his first public appearance.
• B. The chief told him to keep an eye on the man in the blue pants.
• C. Excited the people were when Superman made his public appearance.
• D. Told him to keep an eye the chief on the man in the pants blue.

Answer 1

The correct option is C Excited the people were when Superman made his public appearance.

An effective way to make language more emphatic when using English is by inverting a sentence's normal word order.
For example, 'I have never eaten such a flaky croissant.' is a regular sentence, with the word order: subject (I) + verb (have never eaten) + object (such a flaky croissant).
To add emphasis, the auxiliary verb usually comes before the subject, resulting in the inversion: Never have I eaten such a flaky croissant. ('Never' is an adverb and the main verb is 'eaten')
In option C, the main verb 'excited' comes before the subject 'the people', keeping the rest of the sentence, in the normal word order, intact. Hence this sentence shows inversion and option C is correct.
Option A is incorrect because the sentence is in the normal word order.
Option B is incorrect because this too has a sentence in the normal word order.
Option D is incorrect because the words are not altered in this way: verb + subject + object, but instead this way: verb + object + subject + phrase (that modifies the object). The words are in a jumble, they are incoherent.