Guide to English grammar

What I hate is supermarkets.
A practical guide to English grammar 45
47 Word order and information

1 Information in a statement
Imagine each of these statements as the start of a conversation.

(in a cafe) (at a chemist's) (at a railway station)

This coffee tastes awful. I need something for a headache. The next train is at half past nine.

In each of these statements, the first phrase is the topic, what it is about. The topic is usually the subject. The speaker is giving information about this coffee, I and the next train. The topic is known or expected in the situation: coffee is what we are drinking, I am in the shop, the next train is what we are going to catch. The new information about the topic usually comes at or near the end of the sentence.
This coffee tastes awful.
I need something for a headache.
The next train is at half past nine.
The point of interest, the important part of the message, is awful, a headache and half past nine. It is also the part of the sentence where the voice rises or falls.

For details about intonation, • 54(2).

Each of the statements starts with something known, old information and ends with something new. The listener knows that the speaker is drinking coffee, but he/she doesn't know the speaker's opinion of the coffee: that it tastes awful (= not nice).

2 Information in a text

1 In a text, old information usually comes first in the sentence and new information comes later.

ELEGANT BUILDING

Britain's towns were given a new and an elegant appearance between 1700 and 1830. This period covers the building styles known as Queen Anne, Georgian and Regency, all three of them periods in which houses were very well designed.
Previously, towns had grown naturally and usually had a disorderly, higgledy-piggledy appearance. In the new age, architects planned whole parts of towns, and built beautiful houses in terraces, or in squares with gardens in the middle.
The houses of these periods are well-proportioned and dignified, with carefully spaced windows and handsome front doors. They can be seen in many towns, especially in London, Edinburgh, Bath, Cheltenham and Brighton. Brighton became famous after 1784 when the Prince of Wales, later King George IV, went there regularly and later built the Royal Pavilion.
(from R. Bo wood Our Land in the Making)

The subject of each sentence is something expected in the context. Usually it relates to something mentioned earlier.

Already mentioned Subject of sentence