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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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Aspiring, even established authors, take this on board and do it NOW.
The Apostrophe is for the GENITIVE or when there is a CONTRACTED WORD, and never, not ever for the plural.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Sadly, a decent editor is something too many writers lack. A really worthwhile story works in spite of any such flaws, of course - but (for me) it does impose an unnecessary barrier to my enjoyment.
On the whole, though, I find a sprinkling of errant apostrophes less intrusive than the "hypercorrectness" of using "I" where the sense requires "me". "The mugger hit my partner and I." ...
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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"NW wrote on Tue, 03 March 2015 16:33"Sadly, a decent editor is something too many writers lack. A really worthwhile story works in spite of any such flaws, of course - but (for me) it does impose an unnecessary barrier to my enjoyment.
On the whole, though, I find a sprinkling of errant apostrophes less intrusive than the "hypercorrectness" of using "I" where the sense requires "me". "The mugger hit my partner and I." ...
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Indeed, so does the grammar. 'Hit' is transitive,and requires the accusative, 'me'.
'Myself' used incorrectly is awful, too. "Pete and myself went for a walk." Were that to be correct the Queen of England would speak of "My husband and myself" instead of using "I" correctly.
I spend a lot of time in post production with some authors getting rid of the flying apostrophe
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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ChrisR
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Likes it here |
Location: Western US
Registered: October 2014
Messages: 136
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"Pete and myself went for a walk."
Off coarse its wrong; it was me and Charlie what went fer the wok!
[Updated on: Wed, 04 March 2015 02:05] |
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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Quote:ChrisR wrote on Wed, 04 March 2015 02:03"Pete and myself went for a walk."
Off coarse its wrong; it was me and Charlie what went fer the wok!
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Bizarrely, "Me and Charlie went..." is better on the ear than "Pete and myself..."
I suspect that is because the former is real and the latter is pretentious 'being interviewed on the telly' speak
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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It's not called the "greengrocer's apostrophe" for nothing.
Oddly enough, in Holland, they seem to have a different set of rules, and "FOTO'S" is considered correct.
The best book I've read on the subject of apostrophes, is that wonderful work called "Eats Shoots and Leaves". At my ripe age, I even learned the difference between "the parent's room and "the parents' room".
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ChrisR
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Likes it here |
Location: Western US
Registered: October 2014
Messages: 136
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I will admit my own befuddlement with respect to plural possessives. I've noted a distinctive change in recent years regarding words that end in "s".
I was taught that if a word, singular, ends in an s, the possessive requires an apostrophe-s ending, as in "Mr. Jones's tractor is red." But if the word is plural and ends in an s, it requires only the apostrophe, as in "The Joneses' tractor is red."
Recently, however, I've seen numerous instances in which singular words ending in s are given merely the apostrophe, as in "Lucas' tractor is red." Any thoughts on this dilemma's horns?
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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Quote:ChrisR wrote on Wed, 04 March 2015 16:48I will admit my own befuddlement with respect to plural possessives. I've noted a distinctive change in recent years regarding words that end in "s".
I was taught that if a word, singular, ends in an s, the possessive requires an apostrophe-s ending, as in "Mr. Jones's tractor is red." But if the word is plural and ends in an s, it requires only the apostrophe, as in "The Joneses' tractor is red."
Recently, however, I've seen numerous instances in which singular words ending in s are given merely the apostrophe, as in "Lucas' tractor is red." Any thoughts on this dilemma's horns?
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It's (!) no dilemma. The rules of grammar and syntax are clear. You have it correct.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Matthew
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Toe is in the water |
Registered: February 2015
Messages: 73
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I have no idea and just hope i get it right when it comes to grammar, any talent i have in coming up with a story and writing it is easily wiped away by my lack of grammar skills.
Well i try my best to get it right and hopefully my story isn't riddled with awful grammar
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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"Matthew wrote on Wed, 04 March 2015 22:18"I have no idea and just hope i get it right when it comes to grammar, any talent i have in coming up with a story and writing it is easily wiped away by my lack of grammar skills.
Well i try my best to get it right and hopefully my story isn't riddled with awful grammar
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You do ok. Every editor can use the help of a pedantic editor. There are no exceptions to this. But good editors are scarce as rocking horse poo. Editors, though, must be set guidelines. Are they grammar and syntax and spelling editors, or are they allowed to handle other areas too? J K Rowling, for example, needed to be instructed to cut great swathes of text from her work to remove banal twaddle.
[Updated on: Wed, 04 March 2015 23:37]
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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There are some basics that will help anyone. I've numbered the points, but they are in no real order and are compiled from life experience and advice from teachers and other professional writers.
1/ Re-read the finished product after at least 24 hours have elapsed since you wrote it. The aim is to be reading it as if you didn't write it. Errors such as Paris in the the spring ie doubled up words will often escape notice until time has elapsed as you read what you think, not what you wrote.
2/ Make sure you've used the correct words for two, to, too, they're, their, your, you're. No spell checker is ever going to help you here and it's a rather common error with amateur writings.
3/ It's is a contraction of it is, not a plural of it which is just its.
4/ Probably the single most overused word in the English language is that. It does have its uses of course but over use can give the appearance of preaching. A good idea is to use the word search facility that Word and many other word processors have to identify them and remove those adding nothing to the meaning.
5/ Think very carefully about using dialect spellings for characters as something that makes the story hard to read can be a turn off. Anthony Burgess's "A Clockwork Orange" is perhaps the best known work to feature dialect spelling but one would have to be very brave to emulate it.
6/ Changes of viewpoint/narrator. This can work but there are plenty of examples where it has been done excessively and again, can serve to put the reader off.
Hope that helps!
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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So many people think the change of voice (the person telling the story, who is not necessarily the same as the narrator) is a change of point of view (your number 6). Point of View, Voice, and Narrator are three rather technical things to handle. And these are not the same as first/third person, a different subject again
Changes of voice are hard to handle without distracting the reader, and are usually in the first person. "This is Peter now", followed by several paragraphs. "Now this is Paul" and several more paragraphs as a technique tends to fail more often than it succeeds. Rewrite the story in the third person if you find you are dong this a lot. Or are you good enough to carry it off? And, if you say you are who else says so? If you write well in first person we can imagine what the other people are thinking or feeling. I want to imagine it.
Changes of Point of View are usually in Third Person writing, and require skill to handle smoothly. Often the point of view fluctuates wildly between protagonists, and this causes readers to shut down. It's hard to bring an example to mind, but you will know Point of View fluctuation when you see it.
Narrators (not the same as first person writing) can seriously harm the work if they are omniscient and obviously so. Use of a narrator to move the tale forward often results in telling the reader the plot, not showing them what is happening. Use of a narrator to solve plot issues for the reader is like using an actor to read out a letter in a TV drama. Just find a better way! Heck, you're the writer! Just do it! Do your best to dispense with a narrator.
Yes, I'm being dogmatic, and no, I do not reject stories out of hand that fail on these counts. But these problems make it harder for me to accept them because they get in my way when reading them to approve them. You don't want to put anything in the way of acceptance, do you?
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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In defense, I was writing a forum post, not a book. Timmy's post though encapsulates the issue nicely, and for me, part of the potential turn off is seeing the letters POV. Any use of a TLA (three letter abbreviation) should always be spelled out in full the first time unless it is in incredibly wide use.
Another point, point 7 perhaps, is read the writing out loud to yourself. This also helps one read what is actually written, and not what you think you wrote.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13750
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Nothing to defend. I was adding to your thoughts 
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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