How to Punctuate Introductory Phrases

 

With a comma. Always. Except when you don’t. Perhaps I should annotate that: In the overwhelming majority of cases, follow an introductory phrase at the beginning of a sentence with a comma.

Adverbial Conjunctions
Eight classes of adverbial conjunctions exist, and a comma should generally follow one in every class. Each of these sentences includes an example of one such part of speech from each class:

Addition: “Finally, I reached the station.”

Comparison: “Similarly, chickens are omnivores.”

Concession: “Naturally, you’ll want to see for yourself.”

(Note, however, that however isn’t always an adverbial conjunction. In this sentence, it’s an adverb modifying important: “However important you think it is, I’m not giving him the message right now.”)

Contrast: “Nevertheless, he didn’t go into detail.”

Emphasis: “Of course, she’ll be there, too.”

(An exception can be made for this particular phrase: There’s a subtle but distinct difference between “Of course, you’ll want to do it your way” and “Of course you’ll want to do it your way.” In the first sentence, your is stressed; in the second, course, perhaps accompanied by a sneer, is emphasized, with a secondary stress on your -- and likely an exclamation point to signal emotion.)

Example: “For instance, the floor was swept but not mopped.”

Summary: “In conclusion, I recommend that we approve the measure.”

Time sequence: “At last, we saw their car approaching.”

(Some writing and editing guides suggest that short introductory phrases don’t require commas; often, such brief modifying phrases involve time: “Yesterday I saw a ghost,” for example, or “In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” I recommend, though, use of commas in such cases. Otherwise, the exception to the rule is rather arbitrary; how long does a short phrase need to be before it merits a comma? And why omit commas in some cases and include others?)

Hence, Still, Then, and Thus
Another class of words may or may not be followed by a comma depending on subtle differences:

“Hence the name,” but “Hence, I was back where I had started.”

“Still the waters raged though the rain had ceased,” but “Still, I try one more time.”

“Then I tried to start the car again,” but “Then, I would have acted differently.”

“Thus we are back where we started,” but “Thus, I concede the point.”

Infinitive Phrases
“To get there, turn right at the second intersection.”

Participial Phrases
“Under the circumstances, I cannot allow it.”

From: Daily Writing Tips

Apostrophe with Plural Possessive Nouns

Most English speakers know that the usual way to make a noun plural is to add -s to the singular: boy/boys, knight/knights, house/houses. They are also aware that the plural of few nouns, like child and ox, is formed with the quaint ending -en: children, oxen.

The modern convention of forming a noun plural by adding -s was not a foregone conclusion. Old English formed noun plurals with five or six endings, depending upon which declension the noun belonged to and how the noun was used in the sentence.

By the Early Middle English period (1100-1300), most of the OE inflectional endings had dropped away, but the plural ending -en was still in the running with -s and -es:

for a time, at least in southern England, it would have been difficult to predict that the s would become the almost universal sign of the plural that it has become. Until the 13th century in the south the -en plural enjoyed great favor, being often added to nouns which had not belonged to the weak declension in Old English. –Alfred Baugh, A History of the English Language p. 191.

We’ve seen how the apostrophe was added as the mark of the singular possessive because of a mistaken notion that a letter was missing before the -s.

Once the ’s became established as the possessive ending of a singular noun, it was inevitable that the apostrophe would also be used in the formation of plural possessives.

Although many writers misuse the apostrophe in the plural possessive, the rule is quite simple, in both American and British usage:

If the plural ends with -s, add an apostrophe: the boys’ kites, the knights’ chargers, General Motors’ mission statement.

If the plural doesn’t end with -s, add ’s: the children’s teacher, the oxen’s yoke.

From: Daily Writing Tips

What to Do When Words Appear Twice in a Row

 

Using a word twice in a row isn’t always a no-no, but there’s always a more elegant way to revise a sentence in which you might initially be inclined to repeat a word immediately. When words collide, try these approaches:

1. “What you do do is your own business.”
Even if this sentence is intended as a counterpoint to a “what you don’t do” proposition, the emphatic first do is superfluous (“What you do is your own business”). If you must retain the repetition, introduce a separating phrase: “What you do decide to do is your own business.”

2. “They had had many arguments.”
Replace the second had with a prepositional phrase (“They had gotten into many arguments”) or a more specific verb (“They had endured many arguments”), or introduce more vivid imagery into a revision (“They had verbally sparred many times”).

3. “I showed her her message.”
Replace one pronoun -- preferably, both of the pronouns -- with a noun (“I showed my sister the woman’s message”). This isn’t a problem with him, because two forms of the pronoun would appear (“I showed him his message”), though, again, if him and his refer to different men, it might be better to specify, in place of one pronoun or the other, one of the men in question.

4. “He came in in disarray.”
Replace the prepositional phrase with a simple verb (“She entered in disarray”).

5. “She gives in in every case.”
Simply recast the final phrase (“She gives in every time”) or flip the phrase to the front (“In every case, she gives in”).

6. “What it is is a travesty.”
“What it is” is always an unnecessarily verbose way to start a sentence. Start with the subject (“It’s a travesty”).

7. “I placed the card I had written on on the desk.”
Recast the prepositional phrase “written on” with on at its head (“I placed the card on which I had written the note on the desk”). But first confirm that the modifying phrase involving written is necessary at all.

8. “We realize that that will not be satisfactory.”
Replace the second that with a noun (“We realize that the proposal will not be satisfactory”).

9. “We will discuss this this evening.”
Replace the first this with a pronoun (“We will discuss it this evening”) or a noun (“We will discuss the matter this evening”).

10. “Is there someone I can talk to to resolve the issue?”
Employ a participial phrase in place in the infinitive phrase “to resolve” (“Is there someone I can talk to about resolving the issue?”) or amplify the second to by replacing it with the phrase “in order to” (“Is there someone I can talk to in order to resolve the issue?”).

Occasionally, an immediate repetition of a word, separated from the first instance by punctuation, is appropriate for emphatic effect (“I have come here from far, far away”). At other times, even though punctuation separates the repetition, a recast would improve the sentence. For example, “Even though I was there, there didn’t seem to be anything for me to do” might be revised to “Even though I was there, I didn’t seem to be of any use” or “Despite my presence, there didn’t seem to be anything for me to do.”

From: Daily Writing Tips

Participles Fused and Otherwise

 

If you don't know what a fused participle is, read on.

The present participle is the form of the English verb that ends in -ing:

walk walked walking

To function as a verb, the present participle must be used with an auxiliary verb:

Jack is repairing the roof.

Used without an auxiliary verb, the participle retains some shadow of its verbal origin, but functions as other parts of speech.

participle functioning as adjective:

Mr. Jones is a loving husband.

participle introducing participial phrase:

Sitting by the window, I watched the parade. (The phrase is adjectival, describing "I")

participle functioning as a noun:

The -ing participle form can also be used as a noun. In that case it gets a new name and is called a gerund.

Gerunds

Gardening is my favorite hobby. (noun, subject of "is")
He likes shooting skeet. (noun, object of "likes")
He loves to talk about hunting. (noun, object of the preposition "about")
Do you mind my asking a question? (noun, object of "mind")

NOTE on Example 4: If I had written Do you mind me asking a question, many of my readers would be quick to scold me for having written a sentence containing a fused participle.

Fused participles
The term fused participle is credited to H.W. Fowler, who hated them. Here's the definition from the OED:

fused participle - a participle regarded as being joined grammatically with a preceding noun or pronoun, rather than as a gerund that requires the possessive, or as an ordinary participle qualifying the noun.

The fused participle resides in the same category as the split infinitive: some writers abhor it and will avoid it any cost, while others recognize that, sometimes, "defusing" a fused participle is worse than leaving it alone.

My practice is to use a possessive noun or pronoun before a gerund in a sentence like the one above. If the result is ugly or nonsensical, I figure out how to rewrite the sentence without using the -ing word. Speaking is another matter. In conversation I probably fuse participles all over the place.

From: Daily Writing Tips

A List of Magical Creatures

 A list of magical creatures for your next story...

A List of Magical Creatures, Fantasy Animals, and Supernatural Beings (bryndonovan.com)

Proper Use of The Colon

 

The colon is a versatile punctuation mark. Here are its three primary functions, followed by a few other uses:

Definition or Expansion

“But here’s the interesting thing: He hadn’t ever been there before.”

Note the capitalization of the first word after the colon. All usage guides agree that in a sentence like “I want you to tell me one thing: the truth,” the first word should be lowercase because it begins a phrase, not a complete sentence. But handbooks are divided over whether to capitalize complete sentences.

The Chicago Manual of Style advises doing so only when the defining or expanding passage following the colon consists of two or more sentences. Others disagree, and though I usually follow Chicago, I concur with them: It can be difficult in a passage to know when the definition or expansion ends, and the distinction between a single sentence and two or more seems trivial and inconsistent.

Setting up a Quotation

He makes this moral argument: “Taking whatever we need from the world to support our comfortable lives is not worthy of us as moral beings.”

Note that the colon concludes an independent clause that introduces a statement; it brings the reader to a temporary halt. Writers, ignoring the grammatical distinction between this construction and a simple attribution, widely but incorrectly use colons in place of commas, as in this erroneous usage: “He voted against it, declaring: ‘The only thing this bill will stimulate is the national debt.’” In this case, or after “He said” or “She asked” or a similar term, a simple comma suffices.

Introducing a List

When a phrase that introduces a numbered, unnumbered, or bullet list, or a run-in list, syntactically comes to a stop, use the colon as the bumper:

“The two central questions in ethical theories are as follows:
1. What is the good for which we strive or should strive, and what is the evil that we would like to or must avoid?
2. What is the proper or desired course of action, and what is the inappropriate or forbidden course of action?”

But when each item in the list is an incomplete sentence that continues an introductory phrase, omit it:

“For this experiment, you will need electrical wire (at least 3 feet), a pair of wire cutters, a battery, a flashlight bulb, and electrical tape.”

When, in the latter example, the list is formatted with the introductory phrase and each item on its own line, “For this experiment, you will need” remains bereft of a colon, and each item ends with a period.

(Notice that my explanatory introduction to each list type above is closed, with a colon.)

Colons are used in several other ways to clarify relationships between words and numbers: They set off a character’s name from a line of dialogue in a script; separate titles and subtitles of books, films, and other works; distinguish between chapter and verse in reference to books of the Bible and in similar usages; and separate numerals denoting hours, minutes, and other units of time.

In addition, they have specific functions in mathematics, logic, and computer programming, as well as informal roles in setting actions or sounds apart from words in email and online chats (much as parentheses are used in quotations and dialogue) and as a basic character in emoticons (arrangements of punctuation marks and other symbols to simulate a facial expression).

But it is when the colon is employed in one of the three primary purposes that errors are most likely to appear and communication is most likely to be compromised.

From: Daily Writing Tips

Why the editor didn’t make it through the first chapter

 

Here are some of the common reasons the editor didn’t make it through the first chapter:

1. Generic beginnings: Stories that opened with the date or the weather didn’t really inspire interest. According to Harmsworth, you are only allowed to start with the weather if you’re writing a book about meteorologists. Otherwise, pick something more creative.

2. Slow beginnings: Some manuscripts started with too much pedestrian detail (characters washing dishes, etc) or unnecessary background information.

3. Trying too hard: Sometimes it seemed like a writer was using big words or flowery prose in an attempt to sound more sophisticated. In several cases, the writer used big words incorrectly. Awkward or forced imagery was also a turnoff. At one point, the panelists raised their hands when a character’s eyes were described as “little lubricated balls moving back and forth.”

4. TMI (Too Much Information): Overly detailed description of bodily functions or medical examinations had the panelists begging for mercy.

5. Clichés: “The buildings were ramrod straight.” “The morning air was raw.” “Character X blossomed into Y.” “A young woman looks into the mirror and tells us what she sees.” Clichés are hard to avoid, but when you revise, go through and try to remove them.

6. Loss of Focus: Some manuscripts didn’t have a clear narrative and hopped disjointedly from one theme to the next.

7. Unrealistic internal narrative: Make sure a character’s internal narrative—what the character is thinking or feeling—matches up with reality.  For example, you wouldn’t want a long eloquent narration of what getting strangled feels like—the character would be too busy gasping for breath and passing out. Also, avoid having the character think about things just for the sake of letting the reader know about them.