Everyday Canvas

On Grammar and Punctuation Vigilantes

I don't ever write in this blog on Sundays, but last night I read something in a book that got my dander up. Someone who thinks she's the patrolwoman of the craft has written this:

"If you still persist in writing, "Good food at it's best," you deserve to be struck by lightning, hacked up on the spot and buried in an unmarked grave." -- Lynne Truss the author of the 2003 book titled, Eats, Shoots, Leaves: Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation.

First, be it in jest, I don't like violence and any attacker-approach to anything. Second, it wasn't the above book, Eats, Shoots, Leaves I was reading, but a different one that borrowed the quote. I'm never going to buy a book written by a nasty vigilante, anyway.

Coming to the reason why I am writing this entry is because I am a linguist and I know that a language changes as do its rules. The author of the above quote may believe she is preserving the nuances of the language but a language always renews itself. The nuances codify an ideal but not the reality.

Truth is, all languages change, some faster than others. They evolve as if they are living beings.

Especially English is an ever growing, revolving, and styling and re-styling language. What is true today may not be the norm tomorrow. What is presented at any time as rules are, in fact, the preferences of the existing moment and time.

I grew up in a time where high-school English teachers impressed on students these rules rather strictly:
Don't split the infinitive. Don't end a sentence with a preposition. Don't start a sentence with however, and, but etc.
As writers, aren't we already disregarding these rules?

The way I see it, good writing depends, first and mainly, on content and then, partly on grammar and punctuation. Yes, as writers we need to watch out for the rules so what we write comes out as fluent and understandable.

Yet, am I saying mixing up "its" and "it's" is okay? Not by any means. We owe it to ourselves to know the difference and to try to make our work as clean and presentable as possible.

What I am saying is that the writers in WdC should never be discouraged by any vigilantes.

In the reviews on this site, when the reviewers correct the grammar and punctuation, the writers need to give those corrections their due attention. I, too, correct a slip or two if I catch them when I review, and I am grateful when other writers catch my booboos.

What I am against is the way any correction is presented. Unkind words in corrections hurt the writers and discourage them from developing their craft.

So, please, friends, do write on with your first goal as being the content of your work. Then, correct or edit later according to the rules that are in use now, in our time.