English, What Is?
I just spent the past half hour or so perusing some posts on a message board on the internet. My reading was for my entertainment, and I'm sure most of the participants were posting for their own enjoyment. That's great. Really.
I have to ask myself, however, if I'm part of a dying breed -- those who can spell, punctuate, and express themselves clearly.
I wouldn't apply for a position at the Chicago Manual of Style, but people!
The kind of crap that passes for writing these days, even of the most casual sort, could possibly get the perpetrators hanged in Grammarland, Styleland, or Punctuationland. I won't even tell you about the horrors which could await these people in Syntaxland.
Sure, my writing has all sorts of flaws. I overuse ellipses ... and maybe my paragraphs are sometimes too short.
But have you seen what passes for casual, bare-boned, off-the-cuff prose these days? It's unintelligible.
One wonders if these people will be running the country someday, or if they already are.
posted by MC @ 10:18 PM
3 Comments:
Clearly, they already are running the country (when they're not in Vacationland).
I overuse parentheses, and I put commas where they don't belong; however, I overuse semicolons even more -- and sometimes I throw a lot of these double-dash-thingies in -- otherwise, how would I write such lengthy and disjointed sentences?
Oh my Yod, you posted!
PS: Most of us have Syntaxland never visited.
Thanks for reading. I think if I post again, at all, ever, it will be little things I learn about English here and there, instead of complaining about others' misuse of the language. That might be fun and actually interesting.
I thought you might appreciate this. Okay, truthfully, I was going to blog it, but I'm feeling imprisoned by my blog, and that I'm on the brink of offending someone with every letter I type, but I feel safe sharing this with you.
Today, Mr Z received a cover letter and a proposal from one of his employees. He had asked the employee to write the proposal with the understanding that he (Mr Z) would edit it before sending it to the prospective client. The proposal was an acid trip gone awry, and quite lengthy, so I won't trouble you with that. The cover letter read as follows (the names have been changed to protect the innocent:
[Mr Z]:
Here is what I have to date. Writing something ahead of you seems
feudal at times but perhaps this will stir up some ideas.
[Employee]
Oh, fuck it. I'm going to send you some excerpts via email, because my life is nothing if I can't laugh at those who would have no clue about why I am laughing at them.
I am still one mean bitch.
If I must burn in hell for this, so be it.
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