The Kings’ English Dethorned
By John Vorhaus | May 23, 2013 |
photo by Theophilos
Hello to all my friends at Writer Unboxed. So happy to be back with you again this month, and particularly happy to announce the release of my new novel, The Texas Twist, which streets on June 1 from Prospect Park Books and answers the eternal question, “What happens when a con man gets conned?” As is my practice, I’m giving away e-versions of my new release to WriterUnboxed readers according to my whimsical nature. This time the quest is simple: Guess the number I’m thinking of! (You can do it, trust me; it can be done. There’s even a clue in my twitter stream.) Send an email with your guess to john.vorhaus@gmail.com. All answers will be evaluated honestly and prizes distributed accordingly.
Okay, now that the shameless self-promotion is out of the way, let’s get down to the fun stuff.
The other day I was rooting through some paper archives, and discovered, or rediscovered, the text you’ll see below. It seems I wrote this comic piece for a syndicated newspaper column called Laugh Lines, which bought a bunch of my stuff back in the mid 1990s but did not, so far as I can tell, print this one.
It’s going to make you laugh. I think I can promise you that. More than that, though, I hope it reminds you how amazing long your writing life is, and how stuff that you thought would never see the light of day may again re-emerge. I mean, this piece lay fallow for almost 20 years. I’d forgotten I even wrote it! Then I stumbled across it again, and the rest is, well, as you’ll see, a bunch of dumb jokes. The point is that nothing goes to waste. Nothing! At minimum, everything we write makes us better writers – this we know – but there’s always a potential new market or second life waiting for your work somewhere down the road.
Okay, here we go, coming to you live from 1994, it’s The King’s English Dethorned…
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Being a pro writer, people are always asking me how to make their prose more fine like wine like mine and I answer that the two most important things to pay attention to are spelling and grammer and I also tell them to never ever split an infinitive and I also tell them not to have run-on sentences or missing commas which are bad. Now I read where the children that are of our schools are’nt learning about good structure and puncturation these days, so as a public service I have drew up a list of all the things you need to make your English well.
COMMAS: These, useful, things, help, break, up, sentences, and, add, emphasis, to, you’re, thoughts. Do, not, though, overuse.
PREPOSITIONS: Ending a sentence is something up with which many pro writer’s will not put. I don’t know why this is so ill thought of.
SENTENCE FRAGMENTS: Bad.
NEEDLESS WORDS: Cut.
(PARENTHESES: To be used in places where they don’t belong.)
QUESTION MARKS: Only use a question mark in a sentence that’s a question?
SPELLING: When it comes to spelling mistakes, slopy proofreading is often the cuase.
ABBREVIATIONS: Avoid abbrevs. when unnec.
EXCLAMATION POINTS! Only use for dramatic effect! Never use more than one!!!
DOUBLE NEGATIVES: Not good. Not now, not never.
CAPITALIZATION: Don’t capitalize Words which Shouldn’t Be.
APOSTROPHE’S: Apostrophes’ are for possessive’s, not for plural’s.
GENDER: The gender of a noun can be masculine, feminine or neutered, as in the case of dogs.
SLANG: Using slang is gnarly.
QUOTATION MARKS: Avoid “superfluous” ones.
COLONS: Tough.
SEMI-COLONS: Semi-tough.
Now that you’ve have mastered the basics – good for you – your ready for some advanced concepts such as – for example – how not to overuse – and I think you know what I mean – dashes.
MISPLACED MODIFIERS: I keep hoping modifiers won’t be misplaced in the back of my mind.
NON SEQUITURS: A non sequitur is something that doesn’t belong, and pro writer’s avoid them, just like the chili tacos at Monty’s TacoMundo, which gives me heartburn something fierce.
REDUNDANCY: Avoid repeating yourself yourself. Don’t say the same thing twice.
OBFUSCATION: Don’t use words that only a sesquipedalian would understand.
SYNTAX: Last is not normally where the verb goes.
BRACKETS: Don’t use brackets. You will feel like a [geek] if you do.
CASES: The nominative case is used to nominate things. The accusative case is used to accuse people. Use the objective case for objecting.
GERUNDS: Gerunds are not born, they’re made by adding “-ing” to a word. Examples include hiking, biking and Viking.
IRREGULAR PLURALS: Some plurals end in “a.” Data, media, umbrella, etcetera.
COLLOQUIALISMS: Not normally a-ok, natch. Give ‘em the bum’s rush.
FUSED SENTENCES: Don’t leave out the comma you will cause confusion.
Well, there you have it – kids – the kings’ English made “e-z.” Use these [simple) Rules and soon you’ll be a pro writer like I.
Footnote; 2013: — Two things more: A) Feel free to pass this list on to your unalliterated allies, and, 2} These can’t be the only grammatical abhorrations the writing world contain’s how about chirping in here with some of your’s? -jv
John Vorhaus has written seven novels, including Lucy in the Sky, The California Roll, The Albuquerque Turkey and The Texas Twist, plus the Killer Poker series and (with Annie Duke) Decide to Play Great Poker. His books on writing include The Comic Toolbox, How to Write Good and Creativity Rules!
My three teeth grinders: ‘where is it AT?’, modifiers on the word ‘unique’ (most unique, so unique, etceterata) and unnecessary use of the word ‘got’ as in ‘I’ve got…’
Me be lovin’ double negatives!!!!
Oh, hilarious!!!!!
So funny, John. I spit up my tea!
I fidget over the misuse of the word little…and up. I drive my critique buddies crazy with my little red pen marking up their work!
Great post.
Denise Willson
Author of A Keeper’s Truth
Obfuscation… I have read a lot of the late William F. Buckley’s novel. You need a dictionary next to you.
Great Post.
Rosalinda R Morgan
Author of Bahala Na (Come What May)
I remember taking a grammar class in grad school recently, and the professor said, “How RIDICULOUS that we can’t split infinitives and end sentences with prepositions! That’s old school. These things are perfectly fine!” I felt liberated. So for my next class, I submitted a term paper that did all these things — it was returned to me a week later marked up in red. Apparently, not everyone is on board with the revolution. :)
I love this post. And yes kids today need this because they sure aren’t taught to write like we were taught back then. It’s easy to get caught in the run-on sentences and not putting in the commas and such. Love it. Thanks again.
For me, the mis-use of apostrophes is annoying.
In TV dialogues, I listen, mostly in vain, for sentences to include the object of a preposition.
Great list!
Thank you for your short story, The Kings’ English Dethorned, and timely post.
Just the other day…
rediscovered “1994” script. Now up-dating.
Oh, this post is so full of TRUE FACTS!!!
John,
Hilarious, as usual. My favorite pet peeves are the constant misuse of “literally,” as well as “affect” and “effect.” And don’t get me started on using nouns as verbs…Thanks for the laughs.
Brilliant! I would expect nothing less from my mentor. John doesn’t know he’s a Yoda to me, but I learned how to write comedy from his books. No one can teach you how to have a sense of humor, but John teaches you how to translate it into print. I’ve probably read over 300 books on writing. The Comic Toolbox is in my top five. No, I have no relationship with John; this endorsement is completely unsolicited. I just wanted to take the opportunity to say thanks.
I loved this! I thought I knew English and proper punctuation until I turned in my first novel to Cindy for editing. How was I to know there are formal and informal styles? And that books are written in the formal style? I argued with her over adding a comma before the “and” when writing a list. She may have been an English teacher and the school principal, but I knew she had to be wrong. Nope, I was the dummy.
Now, I’m thoroughly lost in how to punctuate, and if it weren’t for spellcheck, I would have a ton of incoherent words. I use way too many commas now.
I would like to put this on my blogs and give a copy to Cindy, plus I’ll put a copy in my ‘Writer File’ for future reference.
Thank you.
You’ve have? Your ready? Was that you pulling our leg?
My biggest pet peeve is misuse of then and than – makes me insane!
Love the post. I teach grammar and love to see this list. Also “who” describes people, “that” describes things. ;)
Fabulously funny but it’s oh-so-sadly true of many high school graduates these days. Even business communications such as e-mails to/from the public are suffering from poor grammar and spelling.
Thanks for sharing this as a reminder that good English doesn’t have to die as long as we writers still care ;-)
Grinders: “Between you and I”, “me and Nathan”, number for amount and vice-versa, ditto for less and fewer.
In speech: “Legitly” [(for legitimately?!!)], 24/7 for multiple activities that cannot co-exist “24/7.”
Love your work. Thank you for it.