In order for us, students of any age, to find and keep the energy we need to stay at our task, we must know the purpose we are working for. This is decidedly true in the study of language, whether we are learning a new one or learning again the rules and graces of our …
Author Archives: rultimo
Clear and Stable
The summer months make clear what the winter ones won’t: nothing stays the same. The sun that rose between the branches outside my window weeks ago now rises farther to the south, and the view is no longer the same for me. The leaves on that same tree flutter in even the calmest breeze, and …
Stop It
There is a fine old classic work on punctuation entitled Mind the Stop by G. V. Carey, published in Britain in 1939. A stop is a Briticism for any of the marks of punctuation (comma, semicolon, colon, and period) which intend to pause the reader to some degree at some specific point in a sentence. …
Understanding, Enjoyment, Love
The purpose of what we’re writing will determine its style. Instructions are best left as simple and direct as the protocol will allow, but in a novel a lengthy passage meant to move the heart in describing a tender moment between lovers may take long and winding sentences to bring the scene poignantly before us. …
The Arts of the Mind
A convincing case could be made, I think, that if ever there were a moment when looking back at the origin of an idea could give us a needed perspective, now might be such a time. We seem to have lost the plot in much of the schooling we confer on our young people. Good …