The Semicolon Humbled by the Mighty
Posted by Matt Uhrich
![[addio] Kurt](http://farm1.static.flickr.com/215/456540226_de8d049e5f_m.jpg)
Photo by [noone]I’m reading Timequake by Kurt Vonnegut. It's a strange book, but I'm finding it funny and interesting and absolutely worth anyone's time. I love reading just about anything he writes. He is so entertaining and so readable—which can't be said for most luminaries of literary fiction. It really doesn’t matter what he is writing about. He is deservedly considered one of the greatest American writers ever.
He gives his opinion of semicolons towards the end of the Timequake.
Let me note that Kilgore Trout and I have never used semicolons. They don’t do anything, don’t suggest anything. They are transvestite hermaphrodites.
Ponder that for a while.
Semicolon!
Posted by Matt Uhrich
Have you ever been reading a novel and part way through noticed a quirk in the author’s style of writing? And then you can’t help but notice it every time it happens. It can be distracting, can’t it?
I’ve started reading novels with the Kindle application for the iPod Touch. I discovered it’s a surprisingly good platform for reading. Since the iPod Touch is back-lit, it is especially useful for reading in the dark. Amazon has also been giving away quite a few Kindle books—often the first book of a series.
The book I’m currently reading on the iPod is His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik. I’m about half-way through and I am enjoying it quite a bit. Once done, I’m sure I’ll continue reading the series. So in this case giving me the first taste for free will pay off.
There is one oddity I’ve noticed in this book—semicolons. I have never seen so many semicolons in any other book in my life. In fact, I believe after reading half of this book, that I’ve seen more semicolons in it than in every other book I've ever read combined. I’m sure they are all being used properly, but it is unusual. And I can’t help but notice almost every semicolon and think to myself, “semicolon!” If Novik goes a whole paragraph without one, I find myself thinking about that.
I present you with an example paragraph:
Every feeling protested against the sacrifice of this dream; yet under the circumstances, he was not even sure he could honorably make Edith an offer which she might feel obliged to accept. And there was no question of courting someone else in her place; no woman of sense and character would deliberately engage her affections on an aviator, unless she was of the sort who preferred to have a complacent and absent husband leaving his purse in her hands, and to live apart from him even while he was in England; such an arrangement did not appeal to Laurence in the slightest.
Three in one paragraph. Outstanding!
This has made me realize how developing tendencies as an author can create distractions for the reader. Even something as small as a punctuation mark can cause a distraction as it did in this case. Remembering this is especially important for writers who are not as skilled as Novik: the book is good enough and interesting enough that I don’t mind the distraction.
That leaves me with two choices, become such a good writer that readers are willing to ignore my distracting quirks or avoid the distracting quirks all-together. Long term, I’m hoping for option one; short term, I’ll do my best to go with option two.
Will you look at that? I used a semicolon. And there is a slim probability I used it correctly. I’ve still got a long way to go to become a master semicolonist.
Good day to you and semicolon!