What's the subject??

Question

Longstanding argument w/friend -
I was awarded the trophy.
What is the subject of the sentence?
I believe that I was taught in high school ('55 grad) that "trophy" was the subject and "I" a retained object ,i.e. an object (indirect in this case) retaining the nominative case. Makes sense to me since "trophy" is clearly the recipient of the action of the passive verb and thus properly the subject. But , I gather from other sources that retained object in this case means something else and "I "is deemed the subject these days. Makes no sense to me.HELP !!!

Mister Micawber · Accepted Answer

'I' is the subject of this passive sentence, whose full form could be construed as 'I was awarded the trophy (by e.g. the judges)'. 'Trophy' is the object. In the unstated 'by the judges', 'the judges' are the agent.

The active form is '(The judges) awarded me the trophy'. Now 'the judges' is the subject (and still the agent), while 'me' and 'trophy' are both objects (this is a ditransitive sentence).

In the passive voice, the agent is often hidden-- that is the frequent purpose for its use. A common teaching is that 'in active voice, the agent is the subject, while in passive voice, the agent is the object'. However, as you can see, this explanation is a little simplistic.

What's the subject??

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