Example sentences of "[be] [was/were] " in BNC.
Previous page Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 31 | In December , a software firm in Osaka whose product was deemed ‘ obscene ’ by the powers that be was raided and its stock of ultra-graphic porn ‘ games ’ confiscated . |
| 32 | It had something to do with history and the past , that excitement , and something to do with potential as well , with what Orwell or somebody had said , that every man really knew in his heart the finest place to be was the countryside on a summer 's day . |
| 33 | The episode had become part of family lore , as well as suggesting that the best place to be was Trazior itself . |
| 34 | Quite early , I made up my mind that all I wanted to be was a top flight boxer , to follow Jack Johnson in my own way and become the first black British heavyweight champion . |
| 35 | What it turned out to be was a lump of clay that I 'd moulded into what looked like a piece of black and wrapped up in silver paper just fooling about and they really freaked out and they kicked me out and had the police involved and everything . |
| 36 | Nick and Carrie were used to timing them now , fairly accurately : they went out for about half an hour and when they came back be was sitting quiet in the kitchen , reading the paper . |
| 37 | The earlier version of English at Nottingham as " elegant dabbling in belles-lettres " stiffened by Anglo Saxon and philology , now made way for a more Leavisian model : " My conception of what a School of English should be was considerably clarified by my reading of Dr. Leavis " notable essay entitled " A Sketch for an English School " in his Education and the University . " |
| 38 | ‘ I never went to any formal acting school — in fact , I 've probably just been very , very lucky getting all the parts I have — though for as long as I can remember all I ever wanted to be was an actress , and to be in the Theatre . ’ |
| 39 | Life as she wanted it to be was momentarily embodied by the don who taught her Greek , a brave and learned man who fought the Turks in Modern Greece . |
| 40 | To be was enough . |
| 41 | If he had a small pond it used to be was two and sixpence that 's all they used to charge , but of course the other boats , now the boats that used to come from Rotterdam they would n't fill up there and they were Dutch boats , they would n't fill up in water out of the Rhine in Rotterdam , they always wait until they come to Ipswich and got fresh water . |
| 42 | Where he wanted to be was right there , but unobserved . |
| 43 | I also spoke of my difficulty in giving talks to the armed forces ; for nothing remotely intellectual was acceptable , and the only use which I felt I could be was in taking along a few maps and indicating the whereabouts of places increasingly mentioned on the wireless or the press ( though they read only the ‘ picture ’ papers ) . |
| 44 | If truth were told , she still did n't care much where she was , she admitted reluctantly , because the one place in the world she longed to be was at Dane 's side , and that was strictly out of bounds . |
| 45 | And one thing Fen had proved himself to be was very human . |
| 46 | Dickinson slammed the stick forward but by then be was falling , wavering , spinning . |
| 47 | erm and as such a likely hiding place for someone to be was beneath the bed , erm I then lifted the bed with one hand , as I had my revolver drawn in the other hand , erm and then seeing no one was underneath it , I I dropped it again . |
| 48 | Quite what that image should be was , in 1990 , undecided . |
| 49 | How uncertain the night had turned out to be was summed up by Maher 's equaliser in the 59th minute . |
| 50 | Paul next door left school , you know , he cou all he wanted to be was a mechanic , it 's , it 's all he 's ever been , he 's really good . |
| 51 | No , the way things used to be was working very well thank you . |
| 52 | That was , that was to be was n't it ? |
| 53 | And , and , and lets remember that the first big shock that British sportsmen got , the first shaking of the earth which intimated that we were n't so hot at these things as we used to be was in professional sport , it was in football , it was when the Hungarians beat England in nineteen-fifty-six , and the Hungarian army officer Elista Pushkas became erm a world figure because he 'd led the team that had humbled British football might . |
| 54 | Some of the South Africans are were last night understood to be unhappy that only the English anthem is to be played , but it was felt better not to cause more controversy in the light of Thursday 's threat by the African National Congress to call a halt to future tours . |
| 55 | The small bottle once again is is the attractiveness of the bottle and we 've found that to be very attractive and people are were very willing to pay a premium price for something like that cos as Thomas said people are buying those bottles to keep them erm initially . |
| 56 | The West Germans , known as ‘ Westies ’ , treat the ‘ Easties ’ as if we are were illiterate idiots . |
| 57 | we 've got a couple of fruit and veg and that , but we are were looking |
| 58 | Now we were at 2,000 feet , the grasslands and such trees as there had been were below us . |
| 59 | One conclusion is that Vietnam could have been a proud success , and would have been were it not for , e.g. , the political constraints on the military . |
| 60 | On Dec. 28 , 1990 , a Vzglyad documentary discussing Shevardnadze 's resignation had been were withdrawn on Gosteleradio 's instructions . |