Monday, November 16, 2009

Apostrophe Problem

Sometimes people have problems with apostrophe placement. One common problem occurs when people use an apostrophe when they really want to indicate plurality, as in the case of VCR's instead of VCRs: VCR's On Sale This Weekend! instead of the correct VCRs On Sale This Weekend! This problem is very common, especially in advertising. Please pay attention!

Friday, November 13, 2009

Friday Literary Quiz--Poetry--Last Lines

1. "He was a very perfect, gentle knight."

2. "Shall be lifted--nevermore!"

3. "The only emperor is the emporer of ice-cream."

4. "About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."

5. "Let's to the Prado and make the most of time."

6. "The throe of Second Manassas share."

7. "Is come, my love is come to me."

8. "He says again, 'Good fences make good neighbors.'"

9. "And I eat men like air."

10. "And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Spelling, Business Names, and Beginning Readers

Ok, I know some people like to be cutesy or quirky in spelling their business name wrong, as in businesses that spell the word quick as kwik, for example. But that can confuse beginning readers. Or if it doesn't confuse them, they'll just think you're not being helpful. That's what I thought when I was learning to read and saw business names spelled incorrectly on purpose. People need to be helpful, not cutesy or quirky when it comes to spelling. Spell correctly. Save the cutesyness and quirkyness for graphics. Set a good example.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Poetry--First Lines Quiz Answers

1. "Do you see this Ring?"
Robert Browning,
The Ring and the Book

2. "A toad the power mower caught,"
Richard Wilbur,
"The Death of a Toad"

3. "There is a singer everyone has heard,"
Robert Frost,
"The Oven Bird"

4. "I thought once how Theocritus had sung,"
Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
"Sonnet I,"
Sonnets From The Portuguese

5. "To sing of wars, of captains, and of kings,"
Anne Bradstreet,
"The Prologue"

6. "The world is charged with the grandeur of God."
Gerard Manley Hopkins,
"God's Grandeur"

7. "There's a certain slant of light,"
Emily Dickenson,
"There's a certain Slant of light,"

8. "Gus is the Cat at the Theatre Door."
T.S. Eliot, "Gus the Theatre Cat,"
Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats

9. "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"
William Shakespeare,
"Sonnet 18"

10. "I must go down to the seas again,"
John Masefield,
"Sea-Fever"

Friday, November 6, 2009

Friday Literary Quiz

Poetry--First Lines

1. "Do you see this Ring?"

2. "A toad the power mower caught,"

3. "There is a singer everyone has heard,"

4. "I thought once how Theocritus had sung"

5. "To sing of wars, of captains, and of kings"

6. "The world is charged with the grandeur of God."

7. "There's a certain Slant of light,"

8. "Gus is the Cat at the Theatre Door."

9. "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

10. "I must go down to the seas again,"

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Book Review

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

This first of The Chronicles of Narnia is fantasy, but it's also a bildugsroman, and a quadruple bildugsroman at that--all four protagonists grow and learn about themselves through the course of the story. And another central character recognizes their progress and sums it up for them in a brief, memorable description.
This book is an exciting read for anyone, but young people will learn a bit at the first of the book about evacuee children in World War II-era England and the people who took them in.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

General Reader Language

I voted today.

Before I voted, I read up on the items on which we have the privilege of voting.

The main reason I read up on the items is to find out what they really say.

Ballot language has gotten marginally better, but it still has to be put in general reader language in other places like voters' guides.

And it's good that the information is available a couple of other places other than the ballot when we get to the polls.

But it should be written in general reader language in the first place, i.e. on the ballot itself.

Why gum up the language on the ballot?

That's not considerate. Or patriotic.

Monday, November 2, 2009

Redundancy, Common Phrases, and Conciseness

Redundancy isn't just a sentence that contains words or phrases or clauses with the same meanings. Redundancy also appears in common phrases. One example is action plan. Now, many times plans don't get accomplished for various reasons and sometimes nothing at all gets done. But the word plan does inherently imply action, and that's why the phrase action plan is redundant. So let's expunge that phrase from usage, verbal and written, for it conveys sloppy thinking and that's not what we need!