Commas: They Save Lives

Today's public service announcement:


*BEEEEEP* This has been a test of the Emergency Comma System. Had this been a real emergency, you'd have a lot of explaining to do to Grandma.

Recommended: "The Book Thief"

Recently I read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I thought it was excellent. It is one of those books that broadly encompasses the human experience. Literally, it made me laugh and cry.

In this blog I’ll hit some of the highlights (with no big spoilers).

Technically, The Book Thief is a young adult novel. But if someone hadn’t told me that, I wouldn’t have known. I think this is one of those great books that you could read over and over again, at different stages of your life, and get different things out of it each time. My 13-year-old neighbor told me students at his school read it. I hope he reads it too.

The Writing

As a writer, it’s hard not to love an author who describes characters like this:

• Mamer was a barrel of a man, with two small bullet holes to look out of. His teeth were like a soccer crowd, crammed in.
• Her wrinkles were like slander. Her voice was akin to a beating with a stick.

I don’t know much about Markus Zusak, but the man has a gift for metaphor. I love that these descriptions are vivid, succinct, and hilarious all at the same time. Yet they also leave the character’s appearance mostly open to personal interpretation.

In this book, Zusak often describes non-physical things as if they were physical, and in doing so he brings them to life in a way I’ve seldom seen. Take this example:

When Liesel left that day, she said something with great uneasiness. In translation, two giant words were struggled with, carried on her shoulder, and dropped as a bungling pair at Ilsa Hermann’s feet. They fell off sideways as the girl veered with them and could no longer sustain their weight. Together, they sat on the floor, large and loud and clumsy.

* * *TWO GIANT WORDS * * *

I’m Sorry

The Narrator

The main character in The Book Thief is a girl named Liesel, who lives in a small town outside Munich during the 1930s and 1940s.

But the narrator is Death. He (she? we never learn) narrates the story in the first person. He describes what happens to Liesel and the other characters, but he also describes his own “job” of carrying away the souls of the recently deceased. It’s Germany during World War II, so as you might imagine, Death puts in some overtime.

I was both intrigued and amused to have Death as the narrator. From an author’s standpoint, it’s clever – what other narrator could be so all-knowing and all-powerful? Only God, I suppose (and if you look at it a certain way, they’re the same thing).

As a character in this story, Death is both supernatural and human. He relays the events without judgment. Judgment is not Death’s job. But he does describe being moved by human beings and the things they are capable of, even in times of great sorrow. At one point, Death mentions God. He says he asks God questions, but God never answers; he just sends Death his next assignment.

The Style

I liked that the story is presented without analysis (other than the colorful metaphors). Mostly it’s just the characters, scenes, and events, plain and bare for you to look at. A style like that forces you to feel your own feelings, relate the events to your own experiences, and form your own opinions.

One of the things I’ve learned about writing fiction is that sometimes it’s better to just lay things out for the reader to see, with no spin, no angle. Let the reader’s imagination do the work. It makes for a more personal experience for the reader. It also makes the story more about the reader than about the author, which is brilliant, when you consider the fact that most authors never meet most of their readers.

We talked about this book at a book club that I attended. I was struck by how different people’s impressions of the story were. Some people thought it was very sad and they didn't like it. Others thought it was wonderfully uplifting. Some readers thought the author was implying certain things that other readers did not. You could get the sense that the author was anti-war, yet you can't point to anything in the book that actually says that.

It was a good book club choice. It gives you a lot to talk about.

For the Editor Hottie in Your Life

Now you have a way to show your affection for that special grammar geek in your life! Click on the picture to open the website and choose a recipient for the e-card.

Hyphens: An Advanced Course

Last time, I offered this rule of thumb for hyphens: If the phrase that you are tempted to hyphenate is the last thing in the sentence, don't hyphenate it. If it is not the last thing in the sentence, hyphenate it.

Of course, the rule of thumb doesn’t tell the whole story. To be more accurate in your hyphen use, you need to look at the phrase’s relationship to the noun(s) in the sentence.

Phrases that Come Before a Noun

If a phrase comes before a noun, and the phrase describes the noun (like an adjective does), then hyphenate it. Examples:

A well-fed dog

A full-time employee

Cutting-edge technology

A three-year-old girl

A fit-to-be-tied animal

The only exceptions to this are if the first word in the phrase is very or ends in -ly.

A barely legal coed

A very funny joke

Phrases that Come After a Noun

If a phrase comes after a noun, and the phrase describes the noun (like an adjective does), then it does not need a hyphen.

Let’s take the same examples used above, and move them so that the phrase comes after the noun. Now they need no hyphen:

That dog sure is well fed, bless his heart.

All of our employees are full time, except the ones who work part time.

The technology in our house is cutting edge.

My daughter is three years old, but she thinks she is sixteen.

When we took its food away, that caterpillar was fit to be tied.

If it didn’t have a hyphen before, don’t add one now:

I’d date her, but she is barely legal.

The jokes he tells are very funny.

Noun Phrases that Stand Alone

If a noun phrase stands alone (in other words, it’s not modifying another noun), it usually doesn’t need a hyphen. Example:

She is an artist who works with mixed media.

Exception: If the meaning of the phrase would be unclear without a hyphen, then use a hyphen to make it clearer. Examples:

The mayor met with big-box-company leaders. (the leaders of big box companies)

The mayor met with big box-company leaders. (the big leaders of box companies)

The mayor met with big box company leaders. (with no hyphens, the meaning is a mystery)

My next blog will be about more-fun topics. (topics that are less dull)

My next blog will be about more fun topics. (a greater number of fun topics)

That girl is quick-witted. (She has a quick wit)

That girl is quick witted. (Same meaning, but without the hyphen, you first read “That girl is quick,” and then when you read on, you see “witted,” and you have to go back and fix what you thought it meant. A hyphen saves you all that work.)

Non-Noun Uses

Often, I see people hyphenating verb phrases, such as my alderman declaring that summer had kicked-off. This one is easier. You almost never need to hyphenate a verb phrase. The few exceptions to this rule (such as double-space) can be looked up in the dictionary.

Let’s take check in as an example.

Let’s get to the conference early so we can check-in. (WRONG!)

Let’s get to the conference early so we can check in. (CORRECT!)

On the other hand, as we’ve learned above, if that same phrase appeared before a noun and described that noun, then it would get a hyphen.

We ran into our friends at the check-in desk.

And Now...


If you can find the mistake in this sentence, then you’ve earned your diploma in Hyphen Studies!

The good-looking people who read Edit This Blog are incredibly-smart.

Hyphens: An Introductory Course

So I got my alderman's e-newsletter the other day.

It announced that "Summer has officially kicked-off" in our ward.

If you're a proofreader, then you are cringing like I cringed. If you're not, then you may be wondering, "So what's the problem? Those words all look fine to me."

Hyphen usage can be a tough one. It's not like we are drilled on it in school, like we are with spelling. And MS Word's grammar checker is fairly useless when it comes to hyphens.

Hyphen Headaches?

When should you use a hyphen, and when should you leave it out? It depends on how the phrase is used in a sentence: verb, adjective, noun, adverb, or something else. It also depends on where in the sentence the phrase occurs.

But hyphens are not as hard as you may think. In 90% of cases, you can just look it up in the dictionary. Merriam-Webster is great about including the hyphen in phrases where it's correct to use one. Like a good English teacher, Merriam-Webster usually provides examples of the word/phrase used in a sentence so that you can have context and be totally sure. (Side note: Merriam-Webster's beautifully short URL contains a hyphen: www.m-w.com).

Rule of Thumb

If you don't have a dictionary handy, here's a rule of thumb that works in many cases. If the phrase that you are tempted to hyphenate is the last thing in the sentence, don't hyphenate it. If it it is not the last thing in the sentence, hyphenate it.

Let's take the phrase "after hours" as an example.

• The Cat Scratch Club is open after hours. END OF THE SENTENCE = NO HYPHEN.
  
  Here, after hours is being used as an adverb. Adverbs describe verbs. This one describes open. When is the club open? After hours.
  

• My friends and I had consumed several gallons of Red Bull, so we went to an after-hours club after the bars closed. NOT AT THE END OF THE SENTENCE = HYPHEN.
  
  Here, after hours is being used as an adjective. What kind of club? An after-hours club.
  

Kicked Off

Following this rule of thumb, we now see why my alderman's ghostwriter had it wrong. In the sentence "Summer has officially kicked-off," the hyphenated phrase is at the end of the sentence. Verdict: NO HYPHEN. It should have been "Summer has officially kicked off."

Advanced Hyphen Usage

If you want to become a Hyphen God/Goddess, tune in next time, where I take the rule of thumb one step further and lay down the expert rules.