A Comprehensive Guide to English Grammar and its Application to Fictional Writing

[Juvenal]

This is a modern affliction, brought to us by the ubiquity of automated spell-checkers (curse them!)

In days gone by, people had to proof-read what they had written before it was (expensively) committed to public view. But now, when the spell-checker gives your prose a clean bill of health, you are subtly tempted to assume that it actually is what you intended to write and to not bother reading what is really there.

Sadly, even if your magnum opus doesn't have any words underlined in red, you cannot then draw the conclusion that it is without error.

In my experience, spelling checkers cause two types of problem: They fail to highlight use of the wrong variant of a word (there/their etc.), and they also fail to draw your attention to missing words.

On many occasions I have finished a paragraph, then on reviewing it, while still basking in the internal wonder of the idea I was trying to convey, found to my horror that I had missed out whole phrases as my mind raced on ahead of my typing.

By the way, great guide , I hope you are going to extend it with tips on how to write clearly at a scale larger than the sentence (like how to organise paragraphs etc.).

[A Terribly Harmful Name]

I have a bad tendency towards the repetitive use of words in text, mostly because proof reading isn't really one of my talents.

[Owen Glyndwr]

This is a modern affliction, brought to us by the ubiquity of automated spell-checkers (curse them!)

In days gone by, people had to proof-read what they had written before it was (expensively) committed to public view. But now, when the spell-checker gives your prose a clean bill of health, you are subtly tempted to assume that it actually is what you intended to write and to not bother reading what is really there.

Sadly, even if your magnum opus doesn't have any words underlined in red, you cannot then draw the conclusion that it is without error.

In my experience, spelling checkers cause two types of problem: They fail to highlight use of the wrong variant of a word (there/their etc.), and they also fail to draw your attention to missing words.

On many occasions I have finished a paragraph, then on reviewing it, while still basking in the internal wonder of the idea I was trying to convey, found to my horror that I had missed out whole phrases as my mind raced on ahead of my typing.

By the way, great guide , I hope you are going to extend it with tips on how to write clearly at a scale larger than the sentence (like how to organise paragraphs etc.).

I most likely will eventually, given that I can find the time of course. I find writing these chapters to be very time consuming. I don't know why, but it seems to take me well over an hour or two to write them (the last one was written over the course of three days, and took about 4 or 5 hours to do cumulatively, if I recall correctly), probably a combination of the length of the work, and all the fact checking I end up doing.

[desert]

Don't forget the lay-lie dilemma. No matter how many times I read about it, I can never remember the correct usage!

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

Me too. No matter how many times I check, I seem to get lay-lie and affect-effect wrong.

I also never use whom. I think whom has basically become archaic in my local dialect, anyways.

[Ibn-Khaldun]

Me too. No matter how many times I check, I seem to get lay-lie and affect-effect wrong.

I also never use whom. I think whom has basically become archaic in my local dialect, anyways.

And you are from an English speaking country! Try to imagine what us, who don't speak/write/read English everyday, must feel!

[SwissBarbar]

Yes, imagine what burden is laid upon us, who do not speak English. We learn from you. It affects us all, to whom we speak. What an effect could it have, if even native speakers have troubles.

To be serious, I also have problems with lay - laid

[desert]

Everyone does. Apparently some grammarians have just said "**** it" and decided that it doesn't matter anymore.

[soup_alex]

Nicely done, SwissBarbar!

I used to be pretty slick when it came to affect/effect (this was in my early teens, for example), but my ability to distinguish one from the other seems to have taken a thumping of late. I've never felt very confident in my grasp of rules, and it can even take me a few seconds to recognise whether a word is e.g. an adjective or a verb (or something else altogether) in a particular context—my skill in English (can you hear that? That's my trumpet, that is) is something I've long considered attributable to intuition; e.g. I'm fairly competent at identifying the worst kinds of errors in other people's usage and avoiding them (errors, not people, ho ho) in my own, but bloody useless at explaining why for example you should not say:

"LESS EMISSIONS, NOT LESS STYLE!"


(It has just occurred to me, actually, that the problem with the above is that Mr. and Mrs. Vauxhall (or whichever car it was) are using the plural form of "emission". Perhaps they reasoned that the more correct "fewer emissions, not less style" wouldn't sound as catchy, or that by using poor grammar they create a stronger affinity with the type of idiot consumer who believes that buying a new, "greener" car is the best way to save the planet?)

[Lucius Verenus]

Yes, imagine what burden is laid upon us, who do not speak English. We learn from you. It affects us all, to whom we speak. What an effect could it have, if even native speakers have troubles.

To be serious, I also have problems with lay - laid

As an English/English native speaker with a good grounding in American English (thanks to an American wife and the movies)

That quote above had me absolutely cracking up

*cough* sorry

[Tellos Athenaios]

Don't forget the lay-lie dilemma. No matter how many times I read about it, I can never remember the correct usage!

IIRC:

Lie -> Lay -> Laid
That one lay somewhere beneath a layer which now lies on top of everything.
Lie -> Lied -> Lied:
Here's one for you: can you lie you lied?
Lay -> Laid -> Laid:
Lay something back where it laid before.

But yes, I think this is probably the most difficult one. I try to use put instead, can't go wrong with that one.