Punctuation is something that I, as an English nerd and mild Grammar Nazi, love to tiny little bits. Unfortunately, that is not the case for everyone, as I discovered last Friday.
Every October, the eighth grade class at my school does a project in which each student chooses a horror story to read and then writes their own short horror story. I could—and already have, as a couple of my good friends know—go on a long diatribe about more than half the class wanting to read Goosebumps, but I would rather focus on something that concerns me just as much. The lack of proper pronunciation in last year's stories.
Punctuation Exists For A Reason
Now, I'm fine with lax grammar in texting and IMing and whatnot. Even I do it. I'm almost as okay with lax grammar in emails and such, as long as I can understand what the other person means. That does not apply to the final copies of anything. We had to read some of the stories aloud in class, and I really wanted to stop and announce, "I really am a better reader than this! I'm only flubbing because I have no idea where this sentence stops and the other begins. It's madness, I tell you!"
I don't pretend to have perfect grammar, but some things are just wrong and should be corrected—don't worry about emails or what have you, I'm talking about things that might get you laughed at by future generations of eighth graders. Here are some simple rules for writing that might make it simpler to understand than you thought before:
- Periods tell the reader when to pause, because the sentence has ended now and the voice in your head can take a breath before going on.
- Commas indicate a shorter pause, and also when to breathe in longer sentences. Don't, overuse, commas. The voice, in my, head, doesn't, enjoy, sounding, like Stevie, from, Malcolm, in the Middle—although, that does, make it, more, enjoyable.
- The Greeks pioneered modern punctuation, like the above two rules. Lack of punctuation means lack of pauses.
- However, don't not use commas and punctuation or else you'll just go on and on without stopping and I mean this seriously I'm automatically holding my breath while writing this sentence and I don't know why. ALWAYS put a space after a comma, period, semicolon, end parenthesis, or end brackets. No, I don't want to hear it. ALWAYS.
- Quotation marks indicate when to change inflection, because you, the reader, is now repeating what the character said, even when reading to yourself.
- Any time a character is directly quoted using a whole sentence, the punctuation goes inside the quotation marks. If it's just part of a quote, it goes like this: Suzie had said that she didn't want to "play so rough anymore," so Cameron backed off. If the partial direct quote is placed at the end of a sentence, it looks like this: Suzie's mom told him not to "flippantly dangle off those dangerous monkey bars." Cameron had no idea what that meant. This is always true in America, but other countries have other rules.
- "Yes," he said. If you follow a quotation with a "xe said" sort of thing, mentally write it without the "said" bit, and then just add it back in and change the period to a comma. Simpler: "Said" turns periods into commas.
- Exclamation points should be used sparingly. You can usually get away with it in dialog, but only to get across strong emotion—anger, excitement…not usually sadness, though. Outside of dialogue, you really do want to shy away from it. Exclamation points mean excitement, and too much excitement can tire anyone out. In addition, a quote from Reaper Man: Five exclamation marks. A sure sign of an insane mind.
- "If you say said every time you speak, then that's just boring," I said. "If you use it right, it just sort of disappears. But do use, for example, whispered or laughed if the character is actually whispering or laughing their words."
- "It seems complicated, but you'll get the hang of it," Claudia added.
- Don't Capitalize Every Word. That's Not How The Shift Key Works. Proper Nouns And The First Word Of A Sentence, People. You Just Look Like An Idiot Typing Like This.
- Random words Being capitalized changes How You read them. Just Look me in the Metaphorical Eye and Tell me it Doesn't.
- See that button up in the right-hand corner of your keyboard? The one in between 0 and =? That is only to be used for math problems and compound words, like right-hand. That is not how you make a parenthetical. Use -- if you have to, but for God's sake don't use -! (Aside note to Mac users: alt + shift + - equals —)
- Ellipsis…should be used…sparingly, lest you…wind up…sounding…like William Shatner… (Sidenote: Ellipses = Oval; Ellipsis = …)
Some mildly interesting Wikipedia pages on the subject of somewhat-obscure punctuation and grammar paraphernalia:
Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den.
Other places you can find poor grammar corrected (AKA Grammar Made Fun!):
Cake Wrecks
Reasoning With Vampires
Wanton Cruelty To The Common Comma
Other places you can find poor grammar corrected (AKA Grammar Made Fun!):
Cake Wrecks
Reasoning With Vampires
Wanton Cruelty To The Common Comma
