Horror Story for Teens

Couldn't pass this one up without passing it along! Actually at this time of year, it's the students I most want to cut and paste!

Grammar Fun: The Elusive Double Positive

Yesterday George Takei shared a cute anecdote about the MIT professor who was explaining about double negatives. In most languages, such as Spanish, a double negative simply makes things more negative: No tengo nada que decir. (Literally, I don't have nothing to say.) In English, however, a double negative makes a positive. In Standard English they're not allowed. "Nobody has no idea" would become "Nobody has any idea."

The professor tried to argue that there was no language in which a double positive meant a negative.

From the back of the room, a student who was at least paying attention yelled out, "Yeah, right."

Moral: Be careful when making grammatical proclamations. There is almost always an exception somehow!

For more fun with D.R. Ransdell's writing, please visit: http://www.dr-ransdell.com

What Is Editing?

Last week I went to our monthly Sisters-in-Crime meeting, but my attitude was half hearted. The morning speaker was going to talk about editing.

I'm a writing teacher--I grade lots of "college-level" essays each semester. I'm constantly thinking about grammar and straightening out the grammar of my students. Since I'm also an author, I'm always vigiliant when it comes to my own writing. I spend a lot of time working with grammar. This is a normal part of my job both as a teacher and as a writer.

Hence I didn't feel that the speaker from the local community college would be able to teach me anything about grammar. Indeed Terry Filipowicz didn't teach me a single thing about grammar. Instead what she taught me was that in the world of writing and publishing, "editing" means something very different to most people than what it normally means to me.

Terry asked us a rhetorical question at the beginning of her talk. "Would you rather have someone who's good in your field or good as an editor?" she asked the gathering of mystery writers. Then she started talking about some of the "editing" she'd done. She'd toned down scenes that were too explicit, for example. She'd realized that "Danny Boy" had been written after the turn of the century, but the author had placed it in a story that took place a couple of decades earlier.

Master editor having grammar discussion, photo by DRR

To me, toning down a scene is a kind of rewriting. It's re-seeing the text, re-working the text. It's understanding the audience and responding to that audience's needs. Getting a song with the right date is a kind of fact-checking. To me, neither of those actions, while important, would be considered editing.

For me "editing" is always grammar/language/mechanics. I expected the speaker to help us with tricky subjunctive clauses or difficult punctuation cases, not to speak about broader matters.

What ensued was a lively discussion among the authors. Some had hired "editors" to help them work with storylines or character development. They didn't have any complaints about the people they'd engaged for such activities.

When it came to grammar, they had a lot to say because only one had found a good grammar editor (line editor). They were frustrated that they hadn't been able to find someone reliable. They also complained (I was the loudest) about all the flaws they'd seen in recent books, as if current authors simply couldn't be bothered to either proofread their work or pay someone worthwhile to look at it for them.

The point was made that there's no exam to be an "editor." Anyone might call herself an "editor" until not proven guilty. But this meant another painful truth was evident: most people don't know how to edit, especially so-called editors. Instead the onus is on the writer to get it right.Maybe that's where it should be. That's also why I always use my mom and a colleague--both former English teachers--as my primary line editors. Between the three of us, I'm confident we can produce a manuscript with few errors. 

What does editing mean to you? Who do you turn to when you need line editing?

For my recent novels, both of which were carefully line edited, please see http://www.dr-ransdell.com

Free Help, Not So Free

Last week a high school English teacher contacted me. She'd noticed that A Merchant of Venice was on my website for a summer abroad course I teach in Italy. She wanted help creating assignments because "you have so much more experience than me."

I should have been nice. I should have spent lots of time helping her do her work. But, the snark in me won out.  Dear X, I started, "more experience than I...."

I did assure her that her own assignment was just fine.

So far she hasn't contacted me again.

Will she know what was wrong?

Even Dogs Care About Grammar

From 3/7/13

This loldog from I Has a Hotdog was too cute not to share. It's good to know that even dogs are discerning when it comes to grammar!

The Oxford Comma

Tonight I learned a new trick via a blog from a fellow writer at Oak Tree Press.

D.R. at Merton College, where Tolkien taught

I didn't realize that the second comma in a series, the one joining elements and the conjunction, is called "The Oxford Comma." I suppose we could assume the rule is thought of as high class or stuffy somehow, but I was taught to use the Oxford Comma when I started grad school and have been a fan ever since. I agree that the job of punctuation is to aid with clarity. Thus, I dislike reading "My friend went to church, home and school" unless that school is indeed within the home (which I don't like either).

My students don't seem impressed by my preference for using this comma. Even though I tell them that they want credit for their first draft, their second draft, and their susequent drafts, they don't "get" it, and they usually omit the comma. I don't know why they should be so stingy with punctuation. After all, it doesn't cost them anything. Granted, this is still one of their lesser sins, but after having visited Oxford last summer (in search of the inspirations of J.R.R.T.), I will now not only teach the rule but the phrase. Poor students! But if they want to pass, it's best for them to put up with me.

To read the original post:
http://www.otpblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-oxford-comma.html

Luncheon at a Punctuation Party

Susan Vreeland's Luncheon of the Boating Party is a reimagining of the processes Renoir went through to create one of his most famous paintings. The work was a colossal endeavor: a huge canvas made with the help of a variety of friends/models. It was created along the Seine at the Masion Fournaise, not far from Paris.

In the book Vreeland has great fun imagining the decisions that went into the painting, the doubts, the false starts. I purchased the book on the enthusiastic recommendation of a friend with whom I'd seen the famous work.

However, I wasn't able to stay excited about the book. I made it throught the first chapter before running into nonstandard punctuation of a non-restrictive clause. A non-restrictive clause (which could also be thought of as "unnecesary," at least in terms of the grammar of the sentence) takes commas. The commas signal that the information is "extra" information rather than necessary information to identify the subject.

An easy way to understand the difference is this:

If I say

My brother, who lives in Switzerland, has five cats.

the implication would be that I have one brother and that he happens to live in Switzerland. In this case "who lives in Switzerland" is bonus information.

But if my brothers all live in different countries, the phrase "who lives in Switzerland" distinguishes John from all the others. In this case it's a restrictive clause, meaning a necessary part of the sentence that restricts the definition of John. Thus it doesn't take commas. It's not extra.

My brother who lives in Switzerland has five cats.
My brother who lives in Italy has five daughters.
My brother who lives in England is too poor to have anything.

Vreeland's confusing sentence near the beginning of Chapter 2 is "He used to be welcomed anytime, by Jeanne or her mother who stuffed his cheeks with sweets, but that was last winter."

Vreeland's unintended implication is that Jeanne has several mothers, but this one is responsible for stuffing [Auguste]'s cheeks with sweets.

In a similar example at the bottom of the page, Vreeland uses a comma before the first "interrupter," a phrase that interrupts the grammar of the sentence, but fails to use a comma after the phrase. She writes:

Once, just this once he'd....

instead of writing

Once, just this once, .....

It is quite common for writers to make the mistake of using only one comma where they needed two or where they didn't need any at all. To help myself remember this rule, I think: unnecessary (non-restrictive) phrases get commas. We could take those phrases out and still have a perfect luncheon at the punctuation party.