a. The decision saved him a lot of money.
b. He was saved a lot of money by the decision.
Is b. the correct passive version of a.?
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Technically correct, but unnatural. It sounds like a grammar mistake until I get to the end and think it through.– gotube ♦Dec 15, 2022 at 19:27
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I think the "Direct object" of the verb "to save" is "money" and "the indirect object" is "him". So, the passive version might be: A lot of money was saved for him by the decision.– yunusDec 15, 2022 at 19:37
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@gotube Are you sure it's "technically correct"? I think that's assuming that when an active sentence has both indirect and direct objects, you can always produce a passive sentence by using the indirect object as the subject of the passive sentence. Is this assumption without any exception?– listenevaDec 16, 2022 at 3:33
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@listeneva I was speaking only about that one sentence, and it's correct. I was not speaking about sentences of some type, nor assuming anything using logic. It's just my native speaker sense of the sentence, and that's all you asked. If you want to know if it's always possible to form a passive sentence in the way you describe, then ask a new question about that specifically.– gotube ♦Dec 16, 2022 at 6:17
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1@Sam Indirect objects in active sentences can be the subject of equivalent passive sentences: "Tim threw the ball to Mary" can be expressed as "Mary was thrown the ball (by Tim)".– gotube ♦Dec 17, 2022 at 23:23
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