A Common Subject-Verb Agreement Error

rogersgeorge on April 28th, 2024

Third panel. Whose life? Children! A plural! So the sentence should say “their lives” even though they no doubt do the risking one at a time.

Using “their” ought to strengthen the plural agreement.

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A Tricky “Who”

rogersgeorge on January 26th, 2024

We grammar curmudgwons tend to like “whom” as the first word in a sentence because it’s often a direct object, even though it doesn’t feel like it. This sentence is different! First word in the second line:

Mallard Fillmore, in Comics Kingdom for November 20, 2023

Rearrange the words to put the main clause at the beginning: “You had no idea who was even running…” Yes, this “who” is the subject of the subordinate clause, so it’s correct!

Word Order is Important

rogersgeorge on September 28th, 2023

English is relatively uninflected, so where the words are in a sentence makes a big difference. One rule is to put the verb as close as you can to the subject. Here’s and example of not doing this:

What??? The murder goes to auction?

You need two sentences here:

Rare ‘Ides of March’ dagger coin goes to auction. The coin was minted by Brutus after Julius Caesar’s murder. Make sure your writing is not easily misunderstood.

Here’s a picture of the coin:

This Could be Tricky

rogersgeorge on July 16th, 2023

Third panel, last word.

Should that be “him” or “he”? It depends on what he means.

  • “As much as him” means they love reading as much as they love him. (That’s the objective case, correct for a direct object.)
  • “As much as he” would mean they love reading as much as he does. (Nominative case, subject of loves.)
  • I can see wolves loving to eat him, but I don’t think that’s what the sheep would hope for.

Watch Your Subject!

rogersgeorge on November 16th, 2021

Do you see the mistake: Panel 2:

https://www.gocomics.com/adamathome/2021/10/16

“We/us … men” is called an appositive, meaning they are equivalent. That makes the pronoun part of the subject, so it should be “we,” not “us.”

You know that, right?