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How To Write English
By William L. Lampe
Funny how it is that most teachers teach you anything
and everything but how to write English. They tend
to bury the joy of writing in a ton of stiff-necked
rules that few understand, as most don't bother to
relate those rules to the reasons behind them.
Therefore, such rules make little sense and quickly
get lost in the shuffle. So, let's unwind this mystery
one step at a time.
Instead of continued confusion, let us look at writing
as what it really is, a basic communications skill.
Most people and groups of people can speak, and
understand symbolic sounds, so language has
developed as a visual extension of these sounds. If
you aren't physically present, and not near a phone,
fax, computer, drum or other communications device,
writing becomes a viable alternative to vocal
communication. Thirty-five thousand years ago, our
ancestors communicated with their peers and future
descendents, us, by drawing pictures on the walls of
caves. Apparently, humankind has always had a
desire to communicate, so the obvious first choice
was drawing pictures.
Drawing pictures was adequate for simple ideas, but
more complicated thought progressions were near
impossible, so as time passed, humankind developed
a shorthand for picture or graphic communications.
Our ancestors created small, stylized symbols to
equal the information in a large picture- slick idea!
This was handy, as just a few strokes of a stick could
do the job of a large, time consuming image. This
particular medium of communication allowed a more
complete transfer of ideas over time and place.
Commonly known examples of this shorthand were
cuneiform, Sanskrit, and of course, Egyptian
hieroglyphics. True symbol writing evolved as best it
could, but it had major limitations, so in time,
alphabetical writing such as we use today became
prominent.
With picture writing, you could maybe show a hut
and an animal to convey the idea that you lived in a
hut and kept animals. Maybe not. Maybe it meant
that you were a warrior type and took the hut and
animal as spoils of war. Maybe not. It could mean
that you were living in your hut and were hungry and
wanted an animal to eat. Well, maybe, but what if
the hut was a church, and the artist was a priest or
priestess, praying to the gods for the animal as a
desired food item? I guess we'll never know.
Anyway, you can see that drawing pictures can leave
a lot to be desired, as you can't show action, intent,
focus, motivation, desire or very much else without a
pretty complicated picture or series of pictures. Such
pictures would take so long to draw, that by the time
the artist finished, it would often be too late to fulfill
its purpose.
The advantage of symbol writing over drawing full
pictures was simply that the medium took up less
space, time and was portable. A clay tablet is a
bunch easier to move around than a big rock or stone
cliff. Still, it required a lot of meaning-specific
pictures to explain something in any detail. Take
snow for instance. There are many kinds of snow.
Let's see, there is hard-packed snow, soft snow,
melting snow, wet snow, powder snow, compacted
snow, layered snow, yellow snow and blue snow.
Yeah, blue snow. Like in the year of the blue snow.
That was the winter when it got so cold the snow
turned blue. Imagine trying to explain something like
that with pictures or symbols. Good luck- Whew!
With symbol writing, the writer had to know a awful
lot of commonly agreed upon symbols too. Be glad
we now have alphabetical writing, as today, we can
mix and match words to relate just about any idea we
might want to express.
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Let us look at words. They are made up of groupings
of letters. Letters are symbols (vowels and
consonants) symbolizing sounds. In picture writing,
a picture or its symbol equaled an idea, condition,
person, object or thing. Our letters are one step
removed. Instead of our letters directly referring to
the above, our letters equate to sounds that we can
make with our mouths. Do you see the difference?
Our sounds mean various things, but our letters only
represent our sounds or groups of sounds that
represent a word. That's great because, we can use a
finite number of letter combinations to represent an
expanded number of sounds which can carry an
infinite number of meanings. It is much easier to
learn twenty-six letters than ten-thousand symbols.
When we say "cow" everyone thinks of a big, hairy
animal that makes a mooing sound, gives
milk and is good to eat. Great! We all agree on that,
so we can put that grouping of letters in our bag of
tricks which we shall call our vocabulary. Right, a
vocabulary is a known and understood collection of
words that convey specific images to us and to others
who speak and understand the same language. We
need to develop a vocabulary or a bag of words so we
can communicate with other people. We collect such
words one at a time over the years from the time we
are small children. The larger our bag of words, the
better we can communicate. The Bible was written
with a vocabulary of about 300 words, so you don't
have to retain a very large vocabulary in order to
communicate. However, the average high school
student has (or at used to have) a vocabulary of
maybe five thousand or more words. In most cases,
however, we only use a few words and phrases for
our daily communications, so our learning chore is
easier than it looks.
Ok, the fun's over, and now it's time to hunker down
and learn some serious English usage. I'll try to keep
this as light as possible, and maybe even make some
sense out of it. However, I did take the trouble to
check the following against standard grammar and
style books, so I won't lead you too far astray.
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All right, now we need to relate the reasons for the rules
of language so we can make sense out of them. First,
we have ideas and events we want to talk or write
about as is the case. Now, what can we write about?
Well, how about ideas, people, places and things?
Yeah, sure enough, when you think about it, those are
the things we mostly talk or write about anyway.
People, places and things are what we call nouns. A
noun is a word or name that stands for one of the
above. Bill, John, Jerry, Mary, and Sally are all
proper names, they are also proper nouns and should
always be capitalized. That simply means that proper
names, the same thing as proper nouns, should begin
with a big or capital letter.
A bucket, a dog, a house and a car are also nouns, but
they are general names or nouns that can refer to any
bucket, dog, house or car. However, as soon as we
give anything a proper name, we move from general
to specific, and that name must then be capitalized.
General names or nouns are not capitalized, but
specific names are always capitalized. For example,
let us say we buy a dog. As long as we call it a dog
as in "Bring me that dog," we do not capitalize dog,
because dog is a general name and can refer to any
dog. Anyway, you can see that the above sentence
could be confusing if there were very many dogs
present. That is why we need specific names.
However, as soon as we name our dog, Fluffy, then
we must capitalize that name (Fluffy), for it is now a
proper name. "Bring Fluffy over here." Now,
anyone who knows Fluffy couldn't mistake the
meaning of the preceding sentence. Capish?
Even if we decide to call that dog, "Dog," once we
make "Dog" a proper name, we must capitalize it.
When you think about it, this last sentence is a
perfect example of why we must capitalize proper
names. Often capitalization is the only tip-off that
the word is actually a proper name. The name or
noun, car, can be any car, but as soon as we call it a
Ford, then we have given it a proper name, and we
must capitalize that name. The reason for this is so
other people will know that Ford is a proper name,
referring only to one kind of car, and that type of car
is a Ford. The same holds true with Chevy or Dodge.
The repetitive use of proper names or proper nouns
would get tiresome after so long if we used such
names over and over again as in, "Fluffy, ran after
Fluffy's ball." Instead, we would say, "Fluffy ran
after his ball." using a pronoun instead of wearing out
the name Fluffy. Once we have established "Fluffy"
as a proper name, then referring back to Fluffy over
and over again would become a bore, so we have
substituted what we call "pronouns" to take the place
of any established proper name. These handy words,
pronouns, refer to an established proper name
without having to continually repeat that name.
"Sally went to the store, but on the way back, she
stopped to visit her friend." "True, Sue studies hard
in school, but she is lots of fun at parties." Here are
some common pronouns: he, she, it, you, yours, we,
they, their, them, our, ours, himself, herself, and
themselves. Just use pronouns where they feel or
sound right. The queen, herself, showed up at the
ball. Use pronouns to prevent repetitious use of a
proper name. It's easier on the ear as we do this in
speaking. After all, writing is simply a visual
extension of our speech faculty.
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Now, we have that sorted out, we discover that in
most cases, a noun or a proper noun, the name of a
person, place, thing or idea, is usually the subject of a
sentence. The predicate, all the other words except
those that refer directly back to the complete subject
of the sentence, usually tells more about or modifies
that particular subject noun. A complete subject is all
the words that modify or refer directly to the subject.
Example: "The ghost made noise." "The ghost" is the
complete subject. The rest of the sentence is the
predicate and contains the verb and other modifiers
that supply information.
For example, saying, "The house" means little. It is
not a sentence, because it has no predicate that tells
the rest of the story. It is like a picture of a buffalo
on our ancestor's cave wall. You can see it, but you don't
know exactly when it existed, what it was doing or where
it was going. Similarly, one can visualize an image of a
house, but that's about it. However, if we say, "The house is
old and has a ghost." then we have added information
and color about the house. Therefore, we have taken
the concept of a house and made it into a complete
sentence with a predicate that answers several
questions about the house. Namely, it is old and has
a ghost. The mind now has a more complete picture
or concept of the house.
Yeah, yeah, keep your pants on, we'll talk about
verbs later. After all, we are moving down the line in
a linear progression
All kinds of nouns may be subjects, but groups
generally take precedence over individuals. For
example if we say, "The boys, Nick, Jerry and Sam
ran to the store, "the boys" is the subject of this
sentence. Naming the individual boys simply adds
information about who the boys were. "The boys" is
a group, actually one item, singular- a group, even
though it is composed of several items. Collective
words too, are often the subject. "Each had a dollar
for candy." The collective or inclusive word "each"
is the subject of this sentence.
Then, to foul things up is the assumed subject, "you".
Even though the word does not appear in the
following sentence, it is assumed to be there. "Before
starting, study the data." "You" is the assumed
subject. "Before starting, you study the data." Worse
than that, the word "you" is often used as an all
inclusive term, known as the "editorial you" and may
not refer to one individual, but darn near everyone on
the planet.
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Vowels
These are particular letters of the alphabet,
specifically, a,e,i,o,u. Vowels are the basic building
blocks of language, and our cave people ancestors
had them first, as they are natural sounds. Yes,
vowels are the basic grunts that started the whole trip
of language. After vowels came in to common use,
and the people realized they could communicate with
noises, they started adlibbing and messing around to
see what other noises they could combine with their
basic vowels to increase their vocabularies. "Ma, I
need to go peeeeee!" was probably one of the first
addendums.
Now here is something of interest: English is a fairly
modern language and its words are made up of bits
and pieces from other older languages such as Latin,
Greek, German, Scottish, Welch, Celtic, French and
so on. The scary thing is that English is a living
language, so they keep on adding words. Heaven
help us.
Consonants
These are the other letters of the alphabet that
symbolize noises and are not vowels. See? The trick
is to put vowels together with consonants to make
fancy noises that have particular meanings that other
people will understand. When we get enough of
them together in one place, we have ourselves a
language.
Articles
Articles are a, an, the, this, or that. We use these
words as pointers when we say or write, an apple, the
apple, a clock, that horse. This or that. This dog is
close to me, that dog is far away. You may have a
peanut or a pound cake. When you want to be
specific, use "the, this or that" the horse, the dog, the
house, that car, that road, that man and so on. When
you want to be general, use "a or an" a horse, a dog, a
house, a tomato, an onion, an apple an orange. A is
used with consonants; an is used with words that
begin with a vowel, (a,e,i,o,u).
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One of the biggest problems with picture or symbol
writing was the lack of verbs. There was no way to
make a subject do, act think or say things and fit that
action into a meaningful context. Even the simplest
concepts were near impossible to deal with in a
graphic representation. How would you make your
subject come, go, talk, lie down, get up or work? A
picture is in instant in time. You can show your
subject with shovel in hand, but you can't make her
dig- not without animation, at least. Yeah, that's it!
Sentences are the animation of written
communication! Actually, sentences allow for the
expression of a continuing flow of ideas.
Sentences must have a verb in order to be complete.
That is to say, sentences need a verb to make sense.
Verbs provide the action, doing or being in a
sentence. Without a verb (action word) the subject
does nothing. "Being" verbs stem from the verb "to
be" and are considered passive verbs. They are is,
are, am, was and weren't . Just "being" is an action in
itself, but such passive verbs do not a very interesting
sentence make. Therefore, we choose real, live,
kicking action verbs where possible. The idea is to
keep your reader reading instead of sleeping. For
example, "Joe was at the game." is a passive
construction, using a sleeping, uninteresting passive
verb. Instead, wake things up and try, "Joe ran to the
game." How about, "Joe enjoyed the game!" A
sentence is considered as active when the subject
burns calories and does something active like talk,
walk, run, breathe, sleep, play, eat or work. A
sentence where the subject just exists or has an action
performed upon it is considered a passive sentence
and much less interesting.
Adding Information
The simplest sentence can be made up of just two
words, a subject and a verb. "Joe ran." is such a
sentence. Joe is the subject and ran is what he did.
Obviously, we are taking all this grammar one step at
a time. Don't worry, it will get more complicated as
we progress- trust me... Ok, "Joe ran." is a nice,
little active sentence, but it raises lots of questions
like: who is Joe? what caused him to run? where did
he run to? Why did he run? and, How did he run?
We can answer our readers' questions simply by
adding more information to our sentences. "Igor kill"
might be OK for shock value in an old Frankenstein
horror movie, but readers would get pretty bored with
that kind of limited information after a short while.
When communicating by the written word, we try to
make our sentences flow with interesting ideas, facts
and supporting information. We may not be able to
tell the whole story in a single sentence, but we can
craft a series of sentences to tell the story in a
satisfactory manner.
Modifiers
Modifiers are simply words that add information to a
sentence and answer questions about the subject or
verb. Such words bring our sentences to life while
telling part of the story. The important thing is they
answer questions, lending more information to the
sentence. Let us start with adjectives which add
information about the subject.
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These modifiers answer questions about the subject, a
noun or a proper noun. They relate size, color, age,
position, difficulty, ease, stature and more. Add
information (answers) about the subject by adding
adjectives. However, don't overdo it. One or two
adjectives, are plenty. Use more, and your sentences
will slow down like a duck walking in mud. Worse,
literate readers will think you didn't really have much
to say and are padding your sentences. For example,
instead of stacking up adjectives, why not add
information? "Sarah traveled down the red and gold,
flower-strewn road." Revise to: "Sarah traveled the
autumn road on her way to school.:" Don't add
twenty-five cent words to a nickel sentence. Instead,
use good judgment.
Moreover, be sure your adjectives mean what you
think they do. When in doubt, look them up. I
recently read an article where the author claimed to
have "sequestered" his paycheck into a bicycle.
Come on now, sequestered means to have hidden
something. You wouldn't hide your paycheck in a
bike. You would spend or squander your paycheck
on a bike. Don't make your readers wonder why you
incorrectly used a word. This practice of using words
for the sake of impressing readers when you don't
really know what they mean is called verbalizing.
Say what you mean, and mean what you say.
Example:
"Sue wore a dress." This is a good basic sentence, but
let's add some information. "Sue wore a shiny, red
dress." See? Adding information about the subject,
noun or pronoun answers pertinent questions. In this
case, the two adjectives, shiny and red, give readers a
vision of sue, but enough is enough. Never give
readers more or less than they need to know. Unless
you are writing a fashion article, readers don't need to
know the type of material or the thread count.
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Do you have questions about how, when and where?
Adverbs answer those questions. That means they
modify, clarify or elucidate the verb in a sentence.
Adverbs give information about manner, place and
time. They often end in the suffix, ly, but not always,
and other words that end in "ly" may not be adverbs.
The best way to identify an adverb is to ask questions
about the verb in a sentence.
Example sentence:
Mary slowly rode her bicycle over here yesterday
afternoon.
*How? "Slowly" is an adverb because it answers the
question as to "how" she rode her bicycle. Many
adverbs end in "ly".
*When? "Yesterday" is an adverb and answers the
question, "when". Notice yesterday does not end in
"ly".
*Where? "Here" is an adverb as it answers the
question "where". Here doesn't end in "ly" either.
The above example sentence uses three adverbs.
What is the value of using adverbs? The answer is
they allow you to construct more precise sentences
that answer questions about the action (verb).
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Helping verbs add a sense of time to a verb, past,
present and future. Had, have, are and am are
examples of these helpers, which form part of the
verb phrase in a sentence.
Auxiliary or helping verbs are modifiers that are used to
help form verb phrases but cannot do so
independently. There are four basic auxiliary verb
groups:
- To be
- To have
- Modal Auxiliaries
- To do
To be:
This auxiliary verb is used in the
progressive tenses and passive voice:
Progressive Tense:
You are walking.
You were walking.
You have been walking.
Passive Voice:
You are funny.
You were funny.
You have been funny.
To Have:
This verb is used as an auxiliary in the perfect tense:
I have finished my drink.
I had finished my drink.
I have been finished with my drink.
Modal Auxiliaries:
There is only one tense of these verbs and they are
always followed by an infinitive. They are most
commonly used to represent degrees of freedom,
restriction or severity. These verbs show the mode or
conditions of the action.
Most common modal auxiliaries:
will, shall, can, may, need (to), dare, would, should,
could, might, must, ought (to)
Ability: I can run.
Restriction: I can't run.
Necessity: I must run.
Obligation: I ought to run.
Permission: I may run.
To Do
This verb is used when the main verb of the sentence
requires aid of an auxiliary, but there is no other
helping verb that will fit. It is often used in questions,
negative or emphatic statements:
Does he fly?
He flies, doesn't he?
Despite his bad wing he does fly.
Basic Tense Conjugations:
I run, I ran, I am running, I have run, I shall run, I'm going to run.
He runs, he ran, he is running, he ran, He shall run, He is going to run.
She runs, she ran, she is running, she shall run, she is going to run.
You run, ran, are running, you shall run, your are going to run, etc.
We run (a group, singular), we ran, we are running, we shall run, etc.
They run (a group, singular), they ran, they are running, they shall run, etc.
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A participle is a verb acting as an adjective. There
are present participles that mostly end in "ing" like
running, playing, eating. sleeping and talking. There
are also past participles that end in "ed" like
wondered, reasoned, thwarted, sequestered, climbed
and so on. But there are irregular participles too.
Often participles are used with helping verbs.
Examples of present participles:
I am eating. "Eating" is a present participle. It
sounds more complete than, "I eat." I am sleeping,
instead of, "I sleep." I am running. "Running" is a
present participle, better than saying, "I run."
Examples of past participles:
He finished his work. "Finished" is a past participle.
He was famished. "famished" is a past participle.
Q. What was he? A. He was famished.
Examples of irregular participles:
He is interested. In this case, Interested has become
an adjective which modifies "he, the subject". Other
examples of participles that have become adjectives
are: interested, bored, boring, surprised and
surprising.
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These are verbs used as nouns. Often it is the
placement and usage that separates a gerund from a
participle. In the form, "He is running," running is a
participle. It is a verb acting as an adjective. But if
we use the form, "Running, he made excellent time."
running becomes a gerund or noun. Instead of being
an action, a gerund is a name for an action. A gerund
has a noun function while a participle has an
adjective function. Participles denote an action,
while gerunds denote a name for something.
Therefore, "running" can perform a verb function or a
noun function. Sentence structure and placement
dictate what the particular usage is.
Infinative verbs- (Infinitives)
Some sentence structures require the use of an
infinitive which is also a verb used as a noun. These
particular verbs which cross the line into the land of
nouns are always used with "to" as in, to point, to
run, to walk, to agree, to sleep.
Examples:
In order to sleep, she had to take sleeping pills.
The principles agreed to sign the contract.
Because she was excited, she had to collect herself.
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Handy prepositions describe relationships between
words in a sentence. Also, they are locators in time
and space. Usually, they are found in prepositional
phrases which are made up of a preposition, a
determiner and an adjective or two. A determiner or
article is a word that tells us whether we are referring
to a specific or a general thing. For example: The
student, a college, a bit of peanut butter, that girl,
those women or whatever.
Samples of prepositions:
In, before, after, for, between, on, in front of, behind,
under, beneath, beside, into, through, off, over, upon,
across, of, concerning, like, except, about, or,
without, toward, to, around, by, past, at, against, over,
and so on.
Samples of prepositional phrases:
On the table, off the table, behind the table, in front
of the table, on the sea, in the air, over the waves,
under the table, on the horse, in the car, over the wall,
off the wall, and so on.
It is grammatically incorrect to end a sentence with a
preposition or a prepositional phrase. It leaves the
reader hanging.
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These words are joiners. They are and, but, or, nor,
for, so, or yet. Such words may be used to tie
together individual words, phrases and independent
clauses. You may also use the conjunctions, "but"
and "for" as prepositions.
Subordinating Conjunctions
A subordinating conjunction introduces a dependent
clause and indicates the nature of the relationship
between the independent clause and the dependent
clause. The most common are: after, although, as,
because, before, how, if, once, since, than, that,
though, till, until, when, where, whether, and while.
Correlative Conjunctions
Correlative conjunctions always appear in pairs. Use
them to link equivalent sentence elements. The most
common are both/and, neither/nor, not only/but also,
so/as, whether/or, both/and. Technically, they consist
simply of a coordinating conjunction linked to an
adjective or adverb.
Examples:
Both my dog and my cat, like to hunt rats. Both/and
Bring either a coat or a sweater to the party. Either/or
It matters whether or not you learn English. Whether/or
The explosion destroyed not only the building, but also the airplane.
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Interjections
Basically, interjections are short exclamations like,
Hey! or Oh! or What? or Ouch! They lack
grammatical connection to the sentence. That's why
they call them interjections. They are a bit of color
interjected into the sentence. Don't over do them.
Complements
A complement is a word or phrase that completes the
meaning of another word. A complement may be a
subject complement or an object complement.
Odd Tips
That or which or what?
Who refers only to people.
Which refers to animals and things, never people.
Whose may be a replacement for which.
That refers to people, animals and things.
What refers only to inanimate objects, never to people or animals.
Who or whom?
Most often who is used in place of whom. When in
doubt, use who. There is a rule, however. Who and
whom are pronouns. If you would use he/she or they,
use who. If you would use him/her or them, use
whom.
Acronyms
An acronym is an abbreviation of several words
formed by combining their first letters to form
another word. No periods are used between the
letters, and such words are pronounced as spelled.
Hence: COBOL is an acronym for Common Business
Oriented Language. Be careful with these, as many
readers will have no idea of what you are talking
about if you don't explain them first. If your article is
long, restate the full name from time to time.
Initialisms:
This form is much like the above acronym, being
formed from the first letters of several words, but
each letter is pronounced like in (annual percentage
rate) APR.
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There are only three uses for apostrophes:
- Use one when you leave letters out of a word as in
a contraction. Examples: can't, won't, aren't, O'Mally.
- Use to show possession. Example: Joe's bar and
grill. Mary and Paul's Texas Barbecue. Seasons'
greetings! Notice when a word ends in "s" the
apostrophe just tacks on the end, as adding another
"s" would be incorrect.
- Use to indicate the plurals of letters (there are two
m's in communicate), figures (B-29's) dates ('99, the
1990's) and sometimes words (o'clock).
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Use a colon to introduce an explanation, example,
list, or quotation. To use a colon in this manner, it
must follow an independent clause which contains a
subject and verb. An explanation or example can be
a single word, a phrase or a clause. Examples: "Our
company has but one objective: success!" "Success
is predicated upon: acquiring customers." When the
second of two independent clauses explains,
elaborates or illustrates the first, you may use the
colon to join the clauses. Do not use a colon after a
verb.
Example: "They are: lean, hungry, and dangerous."
Revise to: "Our team is ready: they are lean, hungry
and dangerous."
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Use commas to separate a Parenthetical Element
from the sentence proper: A parenthetical element is
a word, clause or phrase that is inserted as an
explanation or afterthought; without the parenthetical
element, the sentence is still complete. Such a phrase
is nonessential to the basic meaning of the sentence
but adds additional information. Separate this phrase
with commas. Example: John, a big guy, went
walking.
Use commas to separate introductory elements from
the rest of the sentence.
Use a comma before a conjunction such as and, or,
nor, but, yet.
Coordinate adjectives: Use serial commas to separate
a series of descriptive but interchangeable coordinate
adjectives. However, no comma is needed before the
last coordinate adjective, preceded by a coordinate
conjunction. Example: red, blue and green. Be
consistent!
Do not place a comma before a series (above).
Use a comma when you want to link, enclose,
separate, or show omissions in a sentence. Example:
(1) Red, but not blue, yellow, but not white. (2) Joe
needed to polish his dull, red paint job.
Use a comma to separate a direct quotation from its
introduction. Example: John said, "Please hand me a
screw driver."
Should there exist two direct quotations in one
sentence as in dialogue, separate both by commas.
Example: "Janet is a good typist," said Jack, "See
how fast she types?"
After the introductory clause, use a Colon (:) instead
of a comma before a long quotation. If the quotation
is a paragraph or more, set it apart with linefeeds
and indent it one inch on both ends (block quote).
Use a comma to separate phrases that contrast.
Example: Use a spoon, not your knife to eat your
peas.
Use a comma to clarify your meaning. Example:
(1)The day after, Joe went to work. (2) "Let's eat,
Grandma!" (3) Inside, it was too warm.
Use a comma to denote a pause in a sentence if it
adds clarification. However, not all pauses require a
comma. Example: Do not place a comma between a
subject and its verb or between a verb and its object.
Use commas judiciously. Too many commas slow
down the reader. Make sure a comma is needed
before inserting one.
Do not place a comma between the elements of a
compound subject or a compound predicate
consisting of only two elements. Example: (1) Both
Joe, and Mary went to work. Revise to: Joe and
Mary went to work. (2) Joe fixed the car, and
submitted a bill. Revise to: Joe fixed the car and
submitted a bill. The latter is a complex sentence and
requires no comma.
Do not place a comma after a coordinating
conjunction. Example: Joe had problems, but, he
was able to fix the car. Revise to: Joe had problems,
but he was able to fix the car. This is a compound
sentence with two complete clauses, requiring only
one comma.
Return to Punctuation Index
Dashes
Often you will want to join two complete sentences
when they have a strong relation. Use a double dash
with a space in manuscript form and a single dash
with space in the printed form- the printed form being
copy going to a print shop.
Sometimes, you want to leave a sentence as an open
thought. Use only three periods, no more, no less.
Use to add power or draw attention to a statement or
after an interjection. Be careful of overuse, as if all
your sentences end with an exclamation point, your
reader won't know which one is most important.
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Use periods to show the ending of a sentence. Use
them also after initials or after a leading number in a
list.
Examples:
1. Joe E. Brown went fishing.
2. M.E. Williams threw a bash.
3. After the party, W.R. Smith went home.
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Do use quotation marks (" ") around a direct quote.
Example: He said, "My game is off." She answered,
"So is mine."
Do use quotation marks around elements of a partial
quote. Example: Mary said, "I set in on a
congressional meeting"…"it was interesting." Here,
you left out the blah, blah, blah, that had no bearing
on the topic.
Do not use quotation marks around an indirect quote
where you are just restating what someone else said
in your own words. Mary said something about
enjoying the meeting. These are your words, not
Mary's so don't use quotation marks.
Do not use quotation marks around a thought as no
one quotes a thought.
Precede a short quote with a comma. She said, "My
car wouldn't start."
Precede a longer quote with a colon.
For a really long quote of paragraph length, at least four
lines, use the colon, separate it with line spaces and indent
both ends about an inch (block quote). Example: Joe said:
"Long quotes should be preceded by a
colon, separated with line spaces and
indented on both ends. Blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and
that's how it is."
Use quotation marks around a title "The Little Train That Could."
Usually the period or other punctuation mark goes
inside the ending quote mark if the quote is the major
part of the sentence. However, if the quote is only a
couple of words at the end of a sentence, the period
goes outside the ending quotation mark.
Should a quotation continue over several paragraphs,
use a quotation mark at the beginning and another at
the end. Do not place each paragraph in quotes. Any
number of words, sentences or paragraphs can be
placed within quotation marks.
Use quotation marks to indicate words or phrases
used ironically, with reservations, or in some unusual
way. Example: using a "tortilla" for a pizza crust is
a
novel idea. Such a word does not need to be
capitalized, unless it is a proper noun.
Dialogue:
When two or more people are speaking just a quote
or two, use paragraph form. However, when there is
a lot of dialogue, let's say a whole conversation, stack
the quotes like in writing a script.
John said, "Mary, do you want to go out?"
Mary answered, "No John, I want to stay home!"
"What do you want for dinner?"
"Oh, I have some frozen tacos- that sounds good."
"That sounds good to me too. Let's eat!"
It isn't necessary to use he said and she said over and
over again in a conversation. The reader realizes that
one speaks and then the other.
Only when the chain is broken is it necessary to
establish who is speaking. Of course, if a third party
enters the conversation, then it is proper to identify
who is speaking unless it is obvious.
Set off a quotation within a quotation with single
quotes. Example: John said, "I was talking to Mary
yesterday, and she said, 'I feel good!' I was glad to
hear that."
Notice that a quote that is a complete sentence within
an existing sentence whether it is a quote or not, can
end with any punctuation mark, and the sentence just
continues on. In this instance, a comma after the
quote wouldn't make sense.
When you add words of clarification inside a quote,
use brackets. Example: The agency representative
explained that they are "unable to help every family
that [they would] like to help."
Put colons and semicolons outside closing quotation
marks. Example: Mary said, "The world is flat";
John disagreed.
Return to Punctuation Index
When you want your readers to see the relationship
between two complete sentences, use a semi-colon
(;). Semicolons are a trigger that tells readers to look
for the relationship or contrast between two complete
sentences.
Example: John drives a Ford; Gracie drives a Buick.
One could use "and" or "but" or some other
coordinating conjunction, but the semi-colon is the
flag that makes the reader look for the relationship
such as in humor, Example: "The hours are long; the
pay is lousy."
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Clauses
A complete clause can stand alone as a complete
sentence and contains a subject and verb.
A dependent clause is an incomplete sentence joined
to a complete clause. It may be missing a subject or
verb. A dependent clause cannot stand alone.
A parenthetical clause adds information to a sentence
but has no grammatical effect upon the sentence,
itself.
A restrictive clause enhances or adds information to
the subject but can be left out with no grammatical
effect. It is a parenthetical clause often called an
appositive. Often it is a name used to modify a phrase
and is restrictive in nature. My best friend, Jerry, is a
work in progress. Jerry, my best friend, ran away
with his bride. Such clauses are separated from the
sentence proper with commas.
A non restrictive clause enhances the sentence, but it
is not specific to the subject and not necessary to the
sentence. It too is a parenthetical clause.
A reversed dependent clause is a secondary clause
that precedes a primary clause and is used for effect.
Example: Running down the street naked, Joe turned
the corner out of sight.
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Sentences
There are four types of basic sentences.
- A simple sentence is one stand-alone, by-itself,
independent clause that contains one subject or
compound subject and one or more verbs. Example:
Mary went to the store. Paul and Mary went to the
store. Paul and Mary went to the store to buy some
milk.
- A compound sentence consists of two independent
clauses joined by a conjunction. Example: Joe bought
an orange, but he would rather have had an apple.
- A complex sentence consists of one independent
clause and one dependent clause. Example: Joe
bought an orange but would rather have had an apple.
Notice the second (dependent) clause doesn't have a
subject but refers back to the subject of the first
independent clause.
- A compound/complex sentence is made up of two
independent clauses joined by a conjunction with a
dependent clause. Example: Joe bought an orange,
but he would rather have had an apple or maybe a
plum.
All kinds of gymnastics can be performed with
sentences, and I've created legal, marathon sentences
as long as 65 words just to try my college professors'
souls. They would invariably mark them as run-on
sentences, but I found great joy in explaining to them
why they were mistaken. Those sentences were
legalistically perfect. The Devil made me do it.
However, experience dictates that people don't like to
read long sentences and can become easily confused
while trying to decipher them. Therefore, if you want
to keep your readers smiling, keep your sentences
short and sweet. Use the various sentence forms to
add variety to your writing, but use good sense.
Give readers material of adequate interest and
information, but don't bore them with trivia. Human
attention span is short and getting shorter.
Write action-filled sentences to keep your reader
interested. Avoid passive structures or include a free
bottle of No-Doze to anyone who will read your
writing.
Use Transitional words often. Such words are the
turn signals of language that give clues to your
readers as to what direction you are taking them. Use
transitions to move readers from one idea to another.
Here are some common transitional words:
therefore, on the other hand, moreover, nevertheless,
however, whereas, whereby, and more. Then there
are the small transition words like: and, but, nor, for,
yet, or (and sometimes) so. The latter do double duty
as connective conjunctions. Usage example: John
fell off his ladder, however, there was a mattress
below so he wasn't injured. Transitional words lend
smoothness to your writing. Mary was fickle,
however, her good looks made up for it. Joe had to
pay his rent, nevertheless, he managed to save ten
dollars. I like to fly, yet there is something to be said
for ground transportation.
When editing your pieces, ask, "Who cares?" and "So
what?" Make the information you publish earn its
keep! I know it's hard to throw out your deathless
prose, but doing so will often greatly improve your
finished product.
Don't verbalize. Before using a twenty-five cent
word, look it up to make sure you know what it
means. Otherwise, you might offend someone, start a
war or order a Texas fruit cake. Never use a word
just because it sounds good. Say what you
mean, and mean what you say! Writing with plenty of
action and information will outshine a piece full of
fancy words that are used to cover up ignorance of
the topic.
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The author of this web site, William L. Lampe is available for
Business Communications, Technical and Copy Writing assignments
through his Editorial Services Consulting Agency,
The A-Company, established 1970.
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