Pedants' Paradise

[jean]

I always used to put a full stop after re but I never will again.

[Pabmusic]

A few years ago, when I was writing school reports, I wrote in the space where it said "name of teacher": Mr. Alpensinfonie. The reports were returned to me, requiring me to remove the full stop after "Mr" on every one of the reports. I think I changed the top few reports before deciding not be such a fool. But it begs the question of when doing the right thing became wrong. And when the wrong thing became right.
Standard practice seems to be to omit the full stop from an abbreviation when the last letter has been retained. Therefore, in orchestral scores, you will see Fl., Ob., etc. with full stops, but Vln, Vla, etc. without...

It is not 'laziness' to choose 9:00 PM or 6:15 AM rather than 9:00 a. m. or 6:15 p. m. - it can be a matter of deliberate choice, or of house style.

I always write JS Bach, CPE Bach, GF Handel, etc rather than J. S. Bach, C. P. E. Bach, G. F. Handel - and it is not 'laziness' that determines my choice.

Yes, Alpie, that has long been the printers' convention. I try to adhere to it, but I do note that I don't usually type a full stop after the initials in J C Bach and similar, though I like to think I would if I wrote by hand.

[Pabmusic]

I always used to put a full stop after re but I never will again.

[Roehre]

(...)
However, I would never write 9.00 pm, or 6.15 am; the latter in particular looks like a real word. It's pure laziness to omit punctuation, even though the effort required to write 6.15 a.m. is minimal.

I wouldn't either, I prefer 9.00h or 21.00h, or 9.15am and 21.15h

[Pabmusic]

...I don't usually type a full stop after the initials in J C Bach and similar, though I like to think I would if I wrote by hand.

I've thought about this a bit more. I think that the main reason I don't type J. C. Bach is that the spacing seems wrong. Writing it by hand, I make the spacing narrower.

[Sydney Grew]

I do approve of Mr. Charles from Shoreham-by-Sea, who has written in to the Times Literary Supplement to complain about one of their reviews. The reviewer in question, a Mr. Abell, two weeks ago praised the "beautifully mannered, patterned description" in this extract from some one's novel:

"on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which was only visible in sunlight."

But as Mr. Charles points out, the word "only" is probably the English word most frequently placed incorrectly. "Not merely more exact, but even more elegant," he reminds us, "would have been: '. . . which was visible only in sunlight.'"

Language is nine tenths logic. We can be sure can we not that people who pay attention to grammatical correctness know what they are talking about, whereas those who do not - well!

[Pabmusic]

I do approve of Mr. Charles from Shoreham-by-Sea, who has written in to the Times Literary Supplement to complain about one of their reviews. The reviewer in question, a Mr. Abell, two weeks ago praised the "beautifully mannered, patterned description" in this extract from some one's novel:

"on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which was only visible in sunlight."

But as Mr. Charles points out, the word "only" is probably the English word most frequently placed incorrectly. "Not merely more exact, but even more elegant," he reminds us, "would have been: '. . . which was visible only in sunlight.'"

Language is nine tenths logic. We can be sure can we not that people who pay attention to grammatical correctness know what they are talking about, whereas those who do not - well!

Well, "visible only in sunlight" is correct, since "only visible in sunlight" means that you can sense it in no other way (by smell, for instance) in sunlight - which is not, I suppose, what the writer's trying to say. However, this is a very mild example of a misplaced "only". I very much doubt whether most people would have to think twice before understanding it's correct meaning, so I would go along with whatever tripped off the tongue more resonantly. If language is nine-tenths logic, it's still one tenth feeling.

[vinteuil]

The monument to Purcell in Westminster Abbey:

"Here lyes Henry Purcell Esq., who left this life and is gone to that blessed place where only his harmony can be exceeded."

The 'only' here I take to qualify 'where' - ie, only in Heaven can Purcell's harmony be exceeded.

But many Radio 3 presenters read it as if the 'only' qualified 'his' - a quite different meaning.

What do others think?

[Thropplenoggin]

The monument to Purcell in Westminster Abbey:

"Here lyes Henry Purcell Esq., who left this life and is gone to that blessed place where only his harmony can be exceeded."

The 'only' here I take to qualify 'where' - ie, only in Heaven can Purcell's harmony be exceeded.

But many Radio 3 presenters read it as if the 'only' qualified 'his' - a quite different meaning.

What do others think?

I agree with Vints.

There was a letter lamenting the incorrect usage of 'only' in The TLS recently:

"...but the particular bee in my own grammatical bonnet concerns the positioning of the world 'only', probably the word in the English language most frequently placed incorrectly. Take for instance what your reviewer of Rupert Thompson's novel Secrecy aptly describes as the 'delicate strands of detail in filigreed prose' to be found in such radiant, evocative phrases as '...on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which was only visible in sunlight'. Not merely more exact, but even more elegant, would have been '...which was visible only in sunglight'.

(Typed out, not copy-and-pasted.)

[Pabmusic]

The monument to Purcell in Westminster Abbey:

"Here lyes Henry Purcell Esq., who left this life and is gone to that blessed place where only his harmony can be exceeded."

The 'only' here I take to qualify 'where' - ie, only in Heaven can Purcell's harmony be exceeded.

But many Radio 3 presenters read it as if the 'only' qualified 'his' - a quite different meaning.

What do others think?

That's a really good one, Vint. It's a question of sense. Qualifying 'where' makes very good sense - his harmony could be exceeded, but only in heaven. If it qualifies 'harmony' there's a problem - what would it mean? Nothing but his harmony can be exceeded? Doesn't make sense - or rather it shifts the emphasis. Purcell's harmony (and only that) can be exceeded in heaven. Presumably nothing else about him can - pity about the harmony.

[jean]

The monument to Purcell in Westminster Abbey:

"Here lyes Henry Purcell Esq., who left this life and is gone to that blessed place where only his harmony can be exceeded."

The 'only' here I take to qualify 'where' - ie, only in Heaven can Purcell's harmony be exceeded.

But many Radio 3 presenters read it as if the 'only' qualified 'his' - a quite different meaning.

What do others think?

You are quite correct, and the mis-stressing was all over the place in his anniversary year as I remember. I wrote letters.

I'm sure there was a discussion about it at some point.

[Sydney Grew]

Not merely more exact, but even more elegant, would have been . . . .

Actually I would take issue with Mr. Charles's "more" in his own phrase "more exact." Can there be degrees of exactitude? Not if "exact" means something like "perfectly corresponding, strictly correct, accurate, admitting of no deviation, rigorous, precise as opposed to approximate."

[Serial_Apologist]

That's a really good one, Vint. It's a question of sense. Qualifying 'where' makes very good sense - his harmony could be exceeded, but only in heaven. If it qualifies 'harmony' there's a problem - what would it mean? Nothing but his harmony can be exceeded? Doesn't make sense - or rather it shifts the emphasis. Purcell's harmony (and only that) can be exceeded in heaven. Presumably nothing else about him can - pity about the harmony.

[gurnemanz]

Interesting that the word "only" is very mobile:

"on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which only was visible in sunlight"
or:
"on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which was visible in sunlight only"

Either of these is possible. I'm not suggesting that they are preferable to " which was visible only in sunlight" which I agree is the most elegant variant.

[kernelbogey]

"on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which only was visible in sunlight"
or:
"on her thighs a dusting of gold hair, which was visible in sunlight only"

If only I could meet this woman....