Category Archives: punctuation
An ancient lesson in structure
A version of this post first ran October 3, 2008 The King James Bible’s stories and ancient words and lovely turns of phrase have influenced legions of writers. I’m charmed by its liberal use of sobering colons: like so. And … Continue reading
Jen Knox defends ‘romantic’ semicolon; 25 ‘terrific novels’ for J-students
Jen Knox, a fiction writer and author of the memoir Musical Chairs, recently issued a nice defense of the semicolon on her blog: Kurt Vonnegut is famous for saying the following: “Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: … Continue reading
Filed under fiction, journalism, punctuation
The semicolon: love it; or hate it
Learn to use the semicolon. Master it. And then never use it again.—Verlyn Klinkenborg, in a lecture to MFA students at Goucher College Kurt Vonnegut also hated the semicolon. Virginia Woolf was at the other end of the scale, of … Continue reading
Filed under dialogue, punctuation, syntax
