Sending an editor really clean copy is a big plus. In the old days, clean copy meant it didn’t have any smudges or coffee splashes or penciled corrections. Now it means your manuscript has words spelled correctly, capital letters and punctuation used properly, paragraphing is appropriate, and apostrophes are in the right places. One editor I sent articles to regularly said my copy was the cleanest of any he received. If my memory is not too fuzzy, he changed a … Read More »

When Shakespeare wrote The Merchant of Venice back in 1596 or ’97, he peppered it with commas. His commas were meant to tell the actors in his play to pause in their reading or emphasize a word or phrase with a hesitation. For thousands of years, commas served as directions to actors and readers. When I directed church choirs, the composer of the anthem would write the music to show where he wanted a pause. Occasionally, when my choir would … Read More »

Although we seldom think about them, conjunctions are among the writer’s best friends. They make it clear what the relationship is between one action and another—and that’s what writing a story is all about, isn’t it? Unfolding events seen as cause and effect, not just random, unsequenced episodes. “Conjunction” means a “joining together,” but that only tells a small part of the tale. For example, look at the conjunctions that appear in that first paragraph: although and and. And certainly … Read More »

If you’re old enough, you’ll remember from your elementary school days (which used to be called grammar school, remember?) that the participle is a verb form used as an adjective. The past passive participle has almost lost its sense of verbiness and become a plain old adjective. (Are you wearing a shocked look at that statement?) Yet the active past participle too often gets buried under the vague imprecisions of our speech. In speech, it’s not so bad. But vague … Read More »

Many of those so-called grammar and punctuation rules that people are pushing in online forums are not really rules at all. Singular they If writers are not debating (or sharing memes) about the serial comma or the number of spaces after a period in online discussions, they’re often railing against the use of the “singular they” in modern usage. “Somebody used the milk, and they didn’t put it back in the refrigerator” should be written, they say: “Somebody used the … Read More »