Revising does not always mean correcting errors. Moving from rough draft through revisions to final copy can also mean changing something good into something even better, or developing a description or line of reasoning from an entirely different angle. There is no arguing with the fact that we all need models to follow in learning …
Author Archives: rultimo
Three Cases
If I told you that Sarah called Michelle, you would know that I do not mean to say Michelle did not call Sarah. And if I told you that Sam sent Mike an email, you would know that I do not mean to say Mike sent Sam an email. So how is it you know …
Seeing Structure
Even in translation, great writers have much to teach us about composition and style. Here is an excerpt from one very long sentence from Anton Chekhov’s short story Gooseberries. The passage here comprises the first two-thirds of a 119-word sentence, and its architectonic structure is surely the first reason the towering sentence does not fall …
The Personal Pronouns
Let’s ask grammatically what sounds at first like a profound philosophical question: What does it mean to say I? We all use the word I a thousand times a day, and each day another thousand times we use the two words associated with it: my and me. So what’s the different between I and me …
Order and Clarity
Let’s take a look at an unassuming simple sentence that illustrates something we have to be careful about in our writing. Keep your eye on word groups: He funded opposition politicians to the government. We certainly understand the sentence; we know what the writer means, and so it passes the bar of logic. But we …