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Grammar Writing - Bloggercises

The inaccurate astrologer

June 23rd 2010 09:46

My astrologer’s advice to me the other day was not to over-complicate things.

My advice to my astrologer is not to over-write things.

Consider the following sentences. 1. With a full moon winking alluringly at Ursa Major this week, it is best not to over-complicate things. 2. With a full moon winking alluringly at Ursa Major this week, it is best not to complicate things.

Grammatical considerations aside, there is no difference in meaning.

The definition of complicate is “to make complex”. There is no such word as over-complicate. If there were, things would get over-messy.

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Posted By: Chris Champion - Category: Grammar, Redundancies, Writing

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Dark corners of the language: an article on articles

October 27th 2009 04:44

English is simple, right? Where French and Italian makes things difficult with two forms of the definite article, masculine and feminine, and German makes things even tougher by throwing in neuter, English uses just one word. The. Isn't that easy?

Unfortunately, no. Which, for example, is correct: "She is in hospital" or "She is in the hospital". The answer depends if you are British or American.

Spare a thought for anyone who has had to learn such nuances as a second language. An interesting example is a German learning English. The German sentence, "Da er Gärtner ist, liebt er die Natur" translates to, "Being a gardener, he is fond of nature". Note that the German construction uses no article before the noun Gärtner while English requires an indefinite article, and German requires a definite article before Natur while English requires no article.

Dig a bit further and it becomes apparent that the rules governing English articles are not simple at all.

One of the least understood dark corners of the language is the use of indefinite articles. A versus an. Is it correct, for example, to say a history or an history?

The issue causes considerable debate, and it is possible in an internet search to find persuasive opinion claiming both are correct. The real answer is "a history", but the reason is a little surprising. Most of us know the rule that an is used before a vowel and a is used before a consonant. What is not always clearly understood is that this applies to the way language is spoken, not written.

Take, for example, an East Londoner who speaks with a Cockney accent. This person would never pronounce the h at the start of the word history. They would say "an 'istory". They would also say an 'ospital and an 'orse etc. And they would be grammatically correct in doing so!

For those who do pronounce the h in history, on the other hand, a rather than an is correct.

It is for the same reason that it is right to use an before words that are spelled with an initial consonant but which are pronounced with an initial vowel sound: an honour, an heir etc. And it is for the same reason that it is correct to use a before a word spelled with an initial vowel but pronounced with an initial consonant sound: a ewe, a university etc.

And the deepest, darkest corner of all surrounds the word historical. "A historical period" is technically correct, and it is easy enough to write it like that. But who amongst us thinks to say it that way? Not me.

research: owl.english.purdue.edu, davidappleyard.com, encarta.msn.com

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Posted By: Chris Champion - Category: Grammar, Definite and indefinite articles, Writing

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Dark corners of the language: the split infinitive

November 30th 2008 06:38

Take an infinitive and split it and listen to the howls. How dare you commit such a crime against the English language, they will cry. It is a common complaint and even those who don't know precisely what a split infinitive is have been heard to sneer.

What is it? For the answer to that, let us turn to Star Trek, the iconic television version which introduced every one of its episodes with a split infinitive: "Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before."

When a verb is preceded by to (to eat, to drink, to walk), interposing a third word is to split the infinitive. To slowly walk, for example, is to split thoroughly. If the mission of the Enterprise had been to go boldly, rather than to boldly go, its travels would have been clear of the stigma of a grammatical crime.

Right?

Well, actually, no.

To split an infinitive is not incorrect. It is disputed, at times hotly, but it is not against the rules of grammar. The venerable Henry Fowler wrote, "No other grammatical issue has so divided English speakers." He shows which side he is on, however, in his Modern English Usage, by calling the rule against splitting the infinitive a "superstition".

The definition of the term split infinitive in the 2,672-page Shorter Oxford Dictionary (Third Edition) includes no mention of illegality, but does include an example, written by no less a luminary of the language than Lord Byron: "To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell; To slowly trace the forest's shady scene."

The perception that splitting an infinitive is ungrammatical stems from the fact that to do so is often considered poor style. The classic example is, "Writers should learn to not split infinitives." The anti-split school of opinion grew quickly in England in the 19th century, a time when the practice suddenly grew in popularity. The debate continues to rage in the UK today.

In the US, the debate rages not at all. They have always - well, at least since the advent of Star Trek, been content to boldly split infinitives. This is despite the advice of Strunk and White, that great voice of authority on American English. It says on P58, "There is precedent from the 14th century down for interposing an adverb between to and the infinitive it governs, but the construction should be avoided unless the writer wishes to place unusual stress on the adverb."

In other words, sometimes advisable, often inadvisable, but never wrong.

So, next time you hear someone ridiculing the use of a split infinitive, tell them to go read Fowler or Byron or Strunk or White. Or politely suggest they try rewording the following - the population is expected to more than double in the next ten years - without splitting the infinitive.

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Posted By: Chris Champion - Category: Grammar, Split infinitives, Writing

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10 rude rules for troubled bloggers

October 15th 2008 03:50

1.
Stop moaning. Stop whining and pouting and looking for someone or something to blame for your blog's lack of success. Admit that this is your fault. Yes, it is. Go on, say to yourself, "This is my blog, this is my responsibility, this is my doing." There, feels strange doesn't it. That's because you are now ready for point two.

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