Re: Part 2 of 2 -- Re: GDP: NR 1.1 Pitches 2008-01-26

[Graham Percival]

On Mon, 4 Feb 2008 09:23:08 -0500
"Palmer, Ralph" <address@hidden> wrote:

> ----------------------------------
> 
> My copy of The Scott, Foresman Handbook for Writers, Fourth Edition,
> (1996), under "Problems with that, which, and who?" says,
>               Understand that both essential (restrictive) and
> nonessential (nonrestrictive) clauses may begin with which. A clause
> introduced by that will almost always be essential. No commas are used
> around such clauses. . . . Context and punctuation, however, determine
> whether a which clause is essential or nonessential. If the clause is
> essential, no commas separate it from the rest of the sentence; if
> nonessential, commas enclose the clause. (Emphasis in the original.)

Interesting!  I must admit that I found nothing objectionable with
the "which"es that Kurt suggested replacing with "that"...
actually, in a few cases, I thought that "which" sounded better.
But I've always avoided learning anything about grammar[1], so I
didn't mind replacing them.


[1]  As a native English speaker, I don't see the point -- I can
speak and write perfectly well without knowing any formal rules of
grammar.  Actually, when I started learning Japanese, I was
confused when the lesson was talking about "subject" and "object",
and had to look it up.

For anybody who thinks that knowledge of formal grammar is
necessary to be a good writer, I have a challenge: sit down and
write the complete rule for pluralization in English.  At a
minimum, what is the general rule which tells you how to pluralize
"foot" and "boot"?  I bet that there's less than a hundred people
on the planet who could formalize anything approaching a complete
rule for English pluralization... yet millions of people can do it
perfectly, recognize and correct mistakes, etc.

Cheers,
- Graham