"?!" - love or hate?!

Discussion in 'Word Mechanics' started by Noya Desherbanté, Dec 19, 2010.

  1. Tysic

    Tysic New Member

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    Correct grammar and(a personal pet peeve of mine) punctuation will 99/100 times improve a piece of writing. That is not to say that if it is improperly punctuated it automatically become a poor piece of writing, but you should only stray from grammatical norms for very good reasons.
     
  2. Reggie

    Reggie I Like 'Em hot "N Spicy Contributor

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    I've never used it that way before. I guess it never came into my mind, but maybe someday I used it by mistake without realizing it.
     
  3. DukeRustfield

    DukeRustfield New Member

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    It is not "correct." It is style. There is no correct style, merely differences. Or we'd all be wearing vinyl short pants because some designer thinks that is the most appealing.

    Flipping through my giant book of Shakespeare, I noticed that pathetic hack had the audacity to use italics to emphasis words. So he gave up his God-given proper English to mangle word structure, obviously making the reader or himself feel like a childish amateur.

    But you will find bold, underline, italics sprinkled very liberally through some of the greatest writing ever written. To say yes, this is fine. And this shows true learning. But THIS is amateur, just seems completely foolish and I don't know how anyone can type that with with a straight face.

    In fact, go back to old Shakespeare, where he literally split words to make his rhythm. He also had some of the craziest punctuation outside an asylum and I'm betting would not pass muster here as being "proper" if its origin wasn't recognized.

    Worry about the writing. Really. Any two novels I pick up has diametrically oposing views on grammar and structure--and this has just happened to me as I finished reading and moved to my next. But they can still both be great books. Writers aren't bricklayers. I can't imagine people telling a fine artist he is doing his brush strokes "wrong." Not every painter is a Rembrandt, some are Picasso. Get over it.
     
  4. Tysic

    Tysic New Member

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    I would say, as an amateur, you should stick to conventional norms unless you have a very good reason for straying from them. Grammar and punctuation rules exist because they make writing clearer. ?! conveys no meaning good writing cannot; therefore, it should be avoided. I cede the point that great artist can bend the rules to their advantage, but would submit that in order to do so they had the requisite grammatical knowledge. I'll return to my first point, which you seem to have overlooked: as a general rule you should stick to the rules unless you have a very good reason not to.
     
  5. popsicledeath

    popsicledeath Banned

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    Please provide links to successful contemporary works by 'fine artists' that use ALL caps words and other ~style~ features as proof we're wrong, instead of just rudely arguing with everyone who is giving you very sound advice and valid perspectives.

    Your analogies don't work, because

    a) When was the last time you saw contemporary works formatted or written like Shakespeare? Are you trying to be published in the future, or hundreds of years in the past? Don't get me wrong, if you're a time-traveler, so Shakespeare is the hottest, most contemporary reference you know, then I'm totally jealous. But if you aren't, then I'd suggest focusing on contemporary standards, not dated ones.

    b) Picasso still had technically sound brush strokes, and better than anyone understood the expectations and conventions, and learned them, and learned where and how he could then push the envelope. He wasn't going in untrained, tossing paint onto a canvass and declaring it STYLE~. So, if you already understand all the conventions and have mastered your art, feel free to go all E. E. Cummings. But make sure you're doing it deliberately, understanding what is and isn't in favor and recognizing that by breaking with convention, you're admitting there ARE conventions and that those conventions are in place for a reason.
     
  6. art

    art Contributor Contributor

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    He doesn't need to. Finding examples of that will neither strenghten nor undermine Duke's central principle, which seems to be, the writer can do what he wants.

    I'm quite fond of the principle.

    Those who are not so fond of it seem to be animated by very practical concerns: will somebody publish it; will somebody like it; will folk buy it.

    Fair enough. Others think differently. More romantically, perhaps.

    Excellence sometimes involves doing things that your contemporaries aren't doing.

    A strange idea for some to grasp but many consider Shakespeare to be no more or less contemporary than Roth or Franzen. The power of art, eh!

    Punctuation points (and italics and caps etc etc) are as much weapons in the writer's arsenal as are words. Why use a cheap punctuation point when what you want to express can be conveyed by words? is the common accusation. That misses the point entirely. Use what is at your disposal. An exclamation point can sometimes express a particular point with great economy and elegance. (It need hardly be said here that ! can be used with sarcasm in mind etc)
     
  7. digitig

    digitig Contributor Contributor

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    Actually, Shakespeare was doing what his contemporaries were doing. Or, more accurately, his editors were.
     
  8. Elgaisma

    Elgaisma Contributor Contributor

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    All caps is bound to become acceptable as the internet starts to shape the literary world. Just like the pace of a novel has increased, and the visual aspect changed with the introduction of TV and film. The short story was tweaked and influenced by radio etc. Whilst I can make an arguement come across - I loved the aesthetics when I made the mistake to start off with - the arguement jumped out the page at me. Doesn't look as good without them lol

    There are several works where an important word begins with a capital to add similar emphasis - it doesn't work if you do it all the time. Or to highlight a word. I know one of my punctuation books has it as an acceptable use. I used it with about 10 words in my book and found it very effective when reading back, the emphasis on those words was different, and it read differently in my mind. Going from there to all caps would not be a huge leap.

    We do in speech exclaim and question or ask a question with emphasis especially if we are being sarcastic. Whilst I won't be using it can see why it may come about that we do.

    I think Sunset Song (less than a hundred years old) - is classic example of what happens with played about punctuation. It is hardwork to read but worth it in my opinion. However you also have to get past the weird watered down dialect.
     
  9. art

    art Contributor Contributor

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    I'm inclined to agree. Sometimes excellence involves doing the same things as your coevals, only better. This doesn't undermine either point though.
     
  10. digitig

    digitig Contributor Contributor

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    It's not necessarily more or less romantically. Yes, linguists have moved away from describing grammar and spelling as "right" or "wrong" and towards describing it as "standard" or "non-standard", which gives people the impression that anything goes. And in a way it does. But that misses the other thing that linguists have been doing. They also look at the effect of a piece of writing or speech, and the real replacement for "right" and "wrong" is "effective" or "not effective". That has a couple of consequences. Firstly, "effective" to "not effective" is actually a sliding scale, not an absolute division. And secondly, whether something is effective or not depends on what effect you want. What is effective language use in an academic journal probably would not be effective language use in bed with a lover or trying to teach a child. Doing xyz distances the reader from the narrative? Well, that doesn't make xyz "right" or "wrong", it depends on whether you want to distance the reader from the narrative at that point.

    That's why I concentrated on the effect of multiple punctuation marks such as the interrobang. The UK satirical magazine Private Eye has a regular feature by the spoof gossip columninst Glenda Slagg, and one of the ways they signal her immaturity and incompetence as a writer is by her use of multiple punctuation marks. Private Eye is not "wrong" to use multiple punctuation in that way, because it is highly effective in conveying what they want to convey. You'll find something very similar in lots of YA fiction written in diary form, because children tend to write that way (and tend to grow out of it). Publishers don't reject those YA novels on the grounds of "bad" punctuation because it communicates effectively the level of maturity of the narrator (and aligns it with that of the target readership). So by all means use interrobangs if you want the effect of an immature or incompetent writer, which you legitimately might. Similarly, use lots of passive voice and nominalisations if you want the effect of academic writing. Neither of them is more romantic, they are simply different effects in the writer's toolkit.
     
  11. art

    art Contributor Contributor

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    Yep, I agree with all that you say, so far as it goes.
    Yet, there remains the possiblity that multiple bangs will at some point be used by a writer in such a manner as to shed new light on their potential use. (And the same holds true for use of CAPS and other apparent eccentricities etc)
    That we (and I happily include me in this) find it difficult to conceive of such thing reflects something of our own limitations.
     
  12. digitig

    digitig Contributor Contributor

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    I agree that that's a possibility, but I think it unlikely and can't think of an example of anything similar happening in language development. What I think is more likely is that the age at which such punctuation is grown out of will get older and older, and that acceptance of it in serious adult writing will slowly creep from the poorly educated to the better educated. Because of that pattern, purists will call it "dumbing down", but it's actually a normal process of language change. So not a sudden transition when one great writer enlightens us, but a slow shift over many generations. Which doesn't help you if you want to use it now!
     
  13. art

    art Contributor Contributor

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    That's all that my argument requires. Happy New Year, digtig!!
     
  14. popsicledeath

    popsicledeath Banned

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    Yes, and 'America' was founded by brave pilgrims who had the courage and foresight to forge into the great unknown..... yet most of them died, and you were far better off waiting a few decades until the settlements became established, if you wanted to survive.

    Most pioneers, of both literal and figurative uses of the words, manage to do little more than set success up for others, not themselves.

    And I, personally, am not ignorantly unable to comprehend the way languages change and evolve. I understand it both from a linguistics perspective and publishing perspective, and accept that language changes over time (otherwise most classics wouldn't be painfully outdated in that department), and what I know and understand is precisely why I warn against most of the things writers are trying to force into their manuscripts under the guise of ~STYLE~

    It's already hard enough to make it as a writer (whatever ones definition of 'make it' is, it's still always hard), do you really want to stack the deck even more against you by making the point you're technically allowed to do anything you want with your grammar and punctuation, so are going to push the envelope to prove a point? Is that really worth it?
     
  15. digitig

    digitig Contributor Contributor

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    I think you'll find that all of them did. But some younger than others, which I think was your point ;)
     
  16. popsicledeath

    popsicledeath Banned

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    Nah, some were the Cullen family, though back then there wasn't a school for them to creepily hang out at picking up mortal chicks.
     
  17. art

    art Contributor Contributor

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    Your concerns are not my concerns. Being published, having a book out, making a crust, are worthwhile goals. But there are other things that are perhaps a little more worthwhile.
     

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