Category Archives: Writing
Pronoun Perplexity
It’s necessary for authors to be careful and explicit regarding the use of pronouns when more than one person is present in the context of a discussion. The antecedents of pronouns may be perfectly clear in the writer’s mind, but … Continue reading
Posted in Editing, Language, Track Changes Meditations, Writing
Tagged antecedents, pronouns
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Nosing Around
This article is from the series Meditations from the Track Changes Column In the course of copyediting, I often find it useful to nose around in (aka research) what great authors of the past did. The sorts of points I seek … Continue reading
Posted in Editing, Language, Track Changes Meditations, Writing
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Meditations from the Track Changes Column
In the course of editing the writing of clients, I encounter much in the way of ticks and bad habits, not to mention sheer ignorance, particularly in the writing of beginners and illiterati — of which I edit more than I’d … Continue reading
Above and Below
Don’t you hate it when you see above and below used as nouns? This lumpy construction usually occurs when the author wants to refer to material within text in a position relative to where the monstrosity occurs. (More precisely before … Continue reading
Footnotes Versus Endnotes
My favorite magazine, The Watchtower, has a series of study articles in the July issue that uses endnotes rather than the footnotes it has used almost if not entirely exclusively in my forty-three years of reading the journal. A friend, … Continue reading
Uncircling, Unfriending, and Unfollowing
Though I don’t maintain an ironclad bullet list of rules about who I follow in my social networks, certain annoyances move me to uncircle, unfriend, or unfollow persons posthaste. (All three italicized words are social networking neologisms.) Give me full … Continue reading
Ulysses by James Joyce — a Reaction
To quote a famous old Alka-Seltzer commercial, “I can’t believe I ate the whole thing.” That was a long song. If you are searching for an intelligent review of the James Joyce’s novel Ulysses, look elsewhere. The book has been … Continue reading
Posted in Arts, Language, Literature, Writing
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Reading in Installments
At any given time I have between one and seven books in my Recent Reading stack marked as current. These are books that I really am reading at present. At this writing there are six on the stack: Washington: A … Continue reading
Posted in Language, Legacy, Opinions, Re: Views, Thoughts, Writing
Tagged AP Stylebook, Elements of Typographic Style, John Grisham, Keith Richards, Ken Burns, Robert Bringhurst, Ron Chernow
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Pale Fire — Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Nabokov‘s 1963 novel Pale Fire appears on a number of lists purporting to identify the greatest novels of the twentieth century. I wouldn’t dare to attempt a literary analysis of Pale Fire. It’s been a staple of literature classes … Continue reading
Posted in Arts, Language, Legacy, Literature, Writing
Tagged Charles Kinbote, John Shade, Pale Fire, Vladimir Nabokov
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Ultrarunning Hyperbole
Certain tainted words occur repeatedly in journalism about ultrarunning, all of which cause noisy alarms to go off in my head whenever I see them. The four most frequent culprits are: crazy grueling test[ing] limits extreme Rarely have I ever … Continue reading
Posted in Language, Legacy, Opinions, Running, Sports, Thoughts, Usage, Writing
Tagged Badwater Ultramarathon, Ultramarathon
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Bone — Jeff Smith
Cover of Crown of Horns (Bone, Vol. 9) Exactly one year ago today Suzy and I attended the world premiere of a documentary about comic book artist Jeff Smith, who is from Columbus area, and a graduate of The Ohio … Continue reading
Posted in Arts, Language, Legacy, Re: Views, Writing
Tagged Bone, Columbus Metropolitan Library, JeffSmith, Out from Boneville
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A Thought on Literary Precision
Compare the consequences of a lack of a single punctuation mark in English and in software. Imagine what would happen if high school students were not permitted to graduate for failing to insert a quotation mark in an essay. I’ve … Continue reading
Posted in Humor, Language, Legacy, Opinions, Thoughts, Writing
Tagged Oscar Wilde, Quotation mark
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Fantastic Writing
At this moment my wife is sitting in the living room watching Lord of the Rings. I tried watching it when it first came out, but fell asleep, and have had no further interest in watching the others. I also … Continue reading
Icy Warts
… or maybe the title should be Eye Sea Wards. When I hear or speak words, I see them spelled out in my head. Similarly, when I read I tend to see the letters in individual words, so that when … Continue reading
Why Do I Write?
Recently I posted a comment to an excellent article written by a friend on Ergo Sum. What I wrote works well as a standalone thought, so I decided to post it here as well. Why do I write? One reason … Continue reading
Rant on Writing
This diatribe was originally foisted upon a class of unmotivated and nearly illiterate university students. It was my job to attempt to teach them something about Unix and Linux, while also demanding, as a matter of school policy, that they … Continue reading
