Learn Spanish (Latin America): El actor, cuyo talento había asombrado al público, ganó el premio. - The actor, whose talent had amazed the audience, won the prize.

El actor, cuyo talento había asombrado al público, ganó el premio.

The actor, whose talent had amazed the audience, won the prize.

Breakdown of El actor, cuyo talento había asombrado al público, ganó el premio.

the audience / the public (setting)

haber

(auxiliary) have

Questions & Answers about El actor, cuyo talento había asombrado al público, ganó el premio.

Does cuyo match the gender of the actor or the talent?

It matches the talent! The relative possessive adjectives (cuyo, cuya, cuyos, cuyas) always agree in gender and number with the thing being possessed (the noun that follows them), not the owner. Since talento is masculine and singular, we use cuyo.

What tense is había asombrado?

This is the past perfect tense. It is formed using the imperfect tense of the auxiliary verb haber (había) plus the past participle of the main verb (asombrado). It translates to 'had amazed' and is used to describe an action that happened before another action in the past (winning the prize).

Why does the sentence say al público instead of just el público?

The verb asombrar (to amaze) uses the 'personal a' when its direct object is a person or a group of people. Since público (audience) refers to people, it gets the 'personal a'. When the preposition a combines with the masculine article el, it forms the mandatory contraction al.

Could I use sorprendido instead of asombrado here?