This book is intended for use in English courses in which the practice of composition is combined with the study of literature. It aims to give in a brief space the principal requirements of plain English style. It aims to lighten the task of instructor and student by concentrating attention (in Chapters II and III) on a few essentials, the rules of usage and principles of composition most commonly violated. The numbers of the sections may be used as references in correcting manuscript.
The book covers only a small portion of the field of English style, but the experience of its writer has been that once past the essentials, students profit most by individual instruction based on the problems of their own work, and that each instructor has his own body of theory, which he prefers to that offered by any textbook.
The writer's colleagues in the Department of English in Cornell University have greatly helped him in the preparation of his manuscript. Mr. George McLane Wood has kindly consented to the inclusion under Rule 11 of some material from his Suggestions to Authors.
The following books are recommended for reference or further study: in connection with Chapters II and IV:
In connection with Chapters III and V:
It is an old observation that the best writers sometimes disregard the rules of rhetoric. When they do so, however, the reader will usually find in the sentence some compensating merit, attained at the cost of the violation. Unless he is certain of doing as well, he will probably do best to follow the rules. After he has learned, by their guidance, to write plain English adequate for everyday uses, let him look, for the secrets of style, to the study of the masters of literature.
If there is room at the end of a line for one or more syllables of a word, but not for the whole word, divide the word, unless this involves cutting off only a single letter, or cutting off only two letters of a long word. No hard and fast rule for all words can be laid down. The principles most frequently applicable are:
| know-ledge (not knowl-edge); Shake-speare (not Shakes-peare); de-scribe (not des-cribe); atmo-sphere (not atmos-phere); |
| edi-ble (not ed-ible); propo-sition; ordi-nary; espe-cial; reli-gious; oppo-nents; regu-lar; classi-fi-ca-tion (three divisions possible); deco-rative; presi-dent; |
| Apen-nines; Cincin-nati; refer-ring; but tell-ing. |
The treatment of consonants in combination is best shown from examples:
| for-tune; pic-ture; presump-tuous; illus-tration; sub-stan-tial (either division); indus-try; instruc-tion; sug-ges-tion; incen-diary. |
The student will do well to examine the syllable-division in a number of pages of any carefully printed book.
The proper place for the word, or group of words, which the writer desires to make most prominent is usually the end of the sentence.
| Humanity has hardly advanced in fortitude since that time, though it has advanced in many other ways. | Humanity, since that time, has advanced in many other ways, but it has hardly advanced in fortitude. |
| This steel is principally used for making razors, because of its hardness. | Because of its hardness, this steel is principally used in making razors. |
The word or group of words entitled to this position of prominence is usually the logical predicate, that is, the new element in the sentence, as it is in the second example.
The effectiveness of the periodic sentence arises from the prominence which it gives to the main statement.
| Four centuries ago, Christopher Columbus, one of the Italian mariners whom the decline of their own republics had put at the service of the world and of adventure, seeking for Spain a westward passage to the Indies as a set-off against the achievements of Portuguese discoverers, lighted on America. |
| With these hopes and in this belief I would urge you, laying aside all hindrance, thrusting away all private aims, to devote yourselves unswervingly and unflinchingly to the vigorous and successful prosecution of this war. |
The other prominent position in the sentence is the beginning. Any element in the sentence, other than the subject, becomes emphatic when placed first.
| Deceit or treachery he could never forgive. |
| So vast and rude, fretted by the action of nearly three thousand years, the fragments of this architecture may often seem, at first sight, like works of nature. |
A subject coming first in its sentence may be emphatic, but hardly by its position alone. In the sentence,
| Great kings worshipped at his shrine, |
the emphasis upon kings arises largely from its meaning and from the context. To receive special emphasis, the subject of a sentence must take the position of the predicate.
| Through the middle of the valley flowed a winding stream. |
The principle that the proper place for what is to be made most prominent is the end applies equally to the words of a sentence, to the sentences of a paragraph, and to the paragraphs of a composition.
Leave a blank line, or its equivalent in space, after the title or heading of a manuscript. On succeeding pages, if using ruled paper, begin on the first line .
Do not spell out dates or other serial numbers. Write them in figures or in Roman notation, as may be appropriate.
| August 9, 1918 | Chapter XII |
| Rule 3 | 352d Infantry |