Susan T. Creations

Here’s my second official rant

Prepositional Endings

As in: She sidled past the group Joe was talking to.

I read a lot, at least two books a week, and I see this horror in almost every tome I open. What is with today’s writers? And our educators? Doesn’t anyone teach proper English usage anymore? The worst part of it – after the fact that the writer hasn’t actually learned his or her craft – is that we’ve become so used to seeing and hearing this egregious usage, it feels right. It sounds right. We no longer see it as a total grammatical snafu. And writing (or saying) it properly sounds awkward and wrong: She sidled past the group to whom Joe was talking. No one talks like that anymore; we’re way too indolent.

I think this whole thing started because people were too lazy to figure out the whole who-whom thing. So they simply did an end run around it by sticking the preposition at the end of the sentence. I ask you, how much intelligence does this show? How many English classes did someone have to skip before this brilliant epiphany struck? Let me state this clearly: Two wrongs do not make a right, no matter how many people take up the preposition-at-the-end chant.

Okay, I can hear you saying, “Yeah, but if we start writing it right, readers will say, ‘Huh?’ We’ll confuse the heck out of them. They’ll hate it. They’ll hate us and our writing.” Well, I could say, “So what?” But I won’t. As much as I hate to admit it, you would have a valid point – valid in our lazy-daisy, instant gratification, you-expect-me-to-actually-think? society. (Which doesn’t at all make it a truly valid point, but at least it’s worth a line or two of ink.)

But following the incredibly dumb madding crowd isn’t the answer. Trading your principles (I’m assuming we all have some, right?) for readership isn’t, either. But a little creativity is. Some judicious re-phrasing – She saw Joe talking to the group of investors. She sidled past them, hoping they wouldn’t see her. – and you have depth and interest and mystery instead of an addlepated, grammatically incorrect sentence.

So, no more laziness. No more bowing to dumber-than-a-doornail convention. You can write it right and still please your audience. Still be read. Still be lauded. And even maybe get paid for good writing! And I’m still waiting to hear your writing peeves. Email them to me: susantwriter@yahoo.com and spout off!