Books, Films Etc

[liadnan]

Lynne Truss, Eats Shoots and Leaves
Oh look, obviously I read and loved this. Even if I do disagree with her from time to time. I think she's funny and largely right. It sometimes seems counter-intuitive to me that, in the age when near-instant communication by writing has become so important, so little attention is paid to punctuation. If you want someone to read what you've written, rather than giving up and hitting delete, and to understand it quickly and fully, then punctuating properly (along with concentrating on grammar) is more use and a damn sight less irritating than any amount of twee little smileys, usenet/IRC acronyms, or faux-html. Besides which, irritable and busy gits such as myself are fairly likely to write you off as ill-educated, lazy, uninterested in what you're saying, and/or impolite in that you're failing to assist me by using the established conventions of written communication, unless we actually know this is not so and that you are (for instance) dyslexic. I know this is frequently unfair, but there it is.

Now firmly part of my working collection of English language reference, which lives on my desk rather than in The Pile, albeit at the less serious end next to the Old Git Amis' The King's English and at the opposite end from various editions of Hart's Rules, Fowler, ODWE and the Concise Oxford. Yes, I used to work for OUP and am still on their books as a copy-editor and proof reader, though I doubt I shall ever do any such work professionally again.

(If anyone's interested, in between come a complete Shakespeare, a KJV, Brewer's Phrase and Fable, a Latin dictionary, The Oxford Book of English Verse (reprint of the original edition), the Bar Code of Conduct, the Economist Pocket Guide to the World in Figures, an Oxford Atlas and, for no apparent reason, an ancient edition of Oxford University Exam. Decrees and Regulations P version, and slightly out of date editions of the Time Out Guides to Eating and Drinking in London and to Pubs and Bars. And the rules to Contract Bridge, what the hell's that doing there?)