Another Use for Commas

We use commas to separate items in a list, to identify an aside remark,  and between certain words, such as city and state. Here’s another use.

Sometimes you need a pause, especially when you represent spoken English, even when you have no grammatical requirement to do so. In fact, you can use this physical pause function even when it would otherwise be incorrect to use a comma:

In fact, the cartoonist added a line break to emphasize the pause! I even used this technique on a post I shared a couple months ago.

Ordinarily you are incorrect to separate a subject and its verb with a single comma, so when you use this technique, be sure you know what you’re doing.

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I was sitting at a restaurant this morning and showed this comic to my waiter (Hi, Rich!) and he laughed. I saw a quick writing lesson, though; one I’ve mentioned before: when to use less and when to use fewer. Use “fewer” when you’re counting.

If they had used “stuff” instead of “things,” “less” would have been appropriate.

PS—yes, she should have said “there are” instead of “there’s.”

This is from a news story about a traffic accident.

It was driven by 44-year-old Catina Isaacs, who state police said died in the crash.

https://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/traffic/2018/09/13/off-duty-dover-officer-sparked-fatal-five-car-crash-dover/1296270002/

If you read this blog with any regularity, you might expect me to say that “who” should be “whom,” but the sentence is correct!

Look for the verb. We have two of them, “said” and “died.” Now look for the subjects. “Police said” is obvious. Now what’s the subject of “died”? It’s “who died”! Not “whom died.” So the nominative form of the personal pronoun is correct.

My condolences to the family.

The problem with “only” is that we tend to put the word too early in the sentence. I’ve mentioned this several times, most recently two posts ago. (Search for “only” in the search box in the upper right corner for more.)

The rule in English is to put adjectives directly in front of the word they modify, and usually we don’t have trouble with this, except in the case of “only” and a few other equivalent adjectives. Here’s an example:

Hurricane Helene is taking a stab at Category 3 strength in the remote Eastern Atlantic, where at least its prowess is harmless.

https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/Week-Landfall-Threats-Florence-Mangkhut-Olivia-Isaac-and-More

I don’t think the writer intends to modify “prowess.” I think the intent is to modify “harmless.”

Hurricane Helene is taking a stab at Category 3 strength in the remote Eastern Atlantic, where its prowess is at least harmless.

The writer could even make “at least” into an aside by using commas:

Hurricane Helene is taking a stab at Category 3 strength in the remote Eastern Atlantic, where, at least, its prowess is harmless.

I never thought about considering the simile as a solution to deciding whether to use “like” or “as” in a sentence until I saw this remarkably content-free comic:

A simile is a figure of speech that compares two things (think noun) by saying one is like the other. Its companion figure of speech is metaphor, which compares two things by saying one is the other. 

Simile: A donkey is like a horse
Metaphor: You, sir, are a donkey

I never heard of anyone in English class having a problem getting these right. 

Deciding whether to use “like” or “as” is a different matter. And here’s the solution:

Are you comparing two things? It’s a simile—use “like.” The donkey is like a clown.
Is it about verbs or adjectives? Use “as.” The donkey is as funny as a clown (is.) He hit his head as he bent over. He’s sick as a dog (is).

(The “is” is implied; I put it in so you could see it.)