When to leave words out

When we connect two coordinate clauses, words for repeated ideas can be left out in the second clause.

Study the examples given below.

Madhu is pretty. Madhu is intelligent.

Madhu is pretty and intelligent. (NOT Madhu is pretty and Madhu is intelligent.)

He put on his coat. He went out.

He put on his coat and went out. (More natural than ‘He put on his coat and he went out’)

Donald took out his pencil. He started drawing.

Donald took out his pencil and started drawing.

She was upset. She didn’t know what to do.

She was upset and didn’t know what to do. (= She was upset and she didn’t know what to do.)

Note that words for repeated ideas are not normally left out in subordinate clauses.

She was upset. She didn’t know what to do.

When we connect these two clauses using the subordinating conjunction ‘because’ we cannot leave out any words.

She was upset because she didn’t know what to do. (NOT She was upset because didn’t know what to do.)

More example are given below.

I had a headache. I enjoyed the movie.

Even though I had a headache, I enjoyed the movie.