When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It: The Parts of Speech, for Better And/Or Worse [Hardcover]

Among writers of English, there is a strong interest in their own language, and a long tradition of manuals by writers who suggest how to use English without error. Ambrose Bierce wrote such a manual, and writers constantly refer (but not necessarily defer) to Fowler, and many can quote Strunk and White from memory. For some reason, contemporary writers on the subject of English are called "language mavens", and they are of two camps, the prescriptivists who would like to tell you how to say something properly according to the rules, and the descriptivists who document how the language is being (rather than should be) used. As usual, there are extremists at both ends of the spectrum, and it would be wise to stick to the middle. That does not mean staying bland. In _When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It: The Parts of Speech, for Better and/or Worse_ (Basic Books), Ben Yagoda is happy to enjoy creative use of English that breaks rules. We would all be poorer without, for instance, Fats Waller's "One never knows, do one?" But he is also happy to emphasize (and, one assumes since he is an English teacher, enforce) the rules that work to promote clarity and understanding. His book isn't really a rulebook, but a survey in nine chapters of nine parts of speech, each a useful essay on usage.

"Ultimately, the issue of correctness just isn't very interesting," Yagoda writes. What is interesting are "words, phrases, and sentences that transcend their meaning - because they're smart, funny, well-crafted, pungent, unexpected, or sometimes wrong in just the right way." There are lots and lots of examples of such lively, perhaps grammatically questionable, usage in all the chapters here. The title of the book, about killing adjectives, is advice generally attributed to Mark Twain, who knew that using the right noun would preclude unnecessary adjectives. But adverbs get even less respect. Elmore Leonard wrote, "I have a character in one of my books tell how she used to write historical romances 'full of rape and adverbs.'" Stephen King wrote, "I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs." Yagoda says that two adverbs need special mention, and in so doing, demonstrates the subjective nature of judging usage. He doesn't like "arguably" as in, "He is arguably the best quarterback in the NFL", because it probably doesn't mean that anyone has taken this stance in an argument, but that the writer is withholding an opinion and standing behind a bogus adverb. But it is a surprise that he likes "like", as in "It's a complete obstruction of, like, freedom" because it makes the speaker seem less pompous (to be sure, this was a spoken, not a written example).

Yagoda dishes out such likes and dislikes in every chapter, with some being idiosyncratic and some conventional but for idiosyncratic reasons. For instance, in a section on sentence adverbs (one adverb to modify a whole sentence, as in "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn"), he says that the most abused and annoying sentence adverb is "actually" which is overused as in "Actually, he's in a meeting", indicating that not only is he in a meeting, but I am actually telling you the truth when he is in a meeting. (It's fun to play the select-the-most-annoying game, and for worst-used adverb, I would have voted for "literally", as in, "She was literally walking on air.") He doesn't like "hopefully" except as meaning "done in a hopeful manner", as in, "He opened the treasure chest hopefully", but thinks it fills a need, as in "The package will arrive tomorrow, hopefully" since "... arrive tomorrow, I hope" sounds Pollyanna-ish. He would not accept, however, such a formation in a written essay. He shows to be foolish one of the prescriptivists' darling rules, that of never ending a sentence in a preposition. The original rule came from Latin usage, not English. While it is true that sentences as a rule should end strongly, forcing a preposition to the interior can weaken it, as in "We are such stuff on which dreams are made", or can render it stupid, as in repairing "I'm turning in," by "Turning in I am," which, Yagoda says, not even Yoda could spout with a straight face. There is plenty of good sense here, and fun in every chapter (yes, in a book about grammar), as well as entertaining sidelights on such things as the origin of the ampersand symbol and the inventor of the @ for e-mail addresses. There is also a lot of good advice quoted from great writers. Yagoda's book won't replace any style manuals, but his tone of tolerance for eccentricity and enthusiasm for colorful usage is welcome, and his own writing is clever and funny.

Just what is it about the adjective that inspires such violent tendencies in otherwise peaceful people?

As Ben Yagoda writes, "They (adjectives) rank right up there with ... the customer-service policies of cable TV companies."

And the reason for this animosity is that adjectives are often used by lazy writers, "who don't stop to think that the concept is already in the noun."

Those of you who love words will appreciate the glossary of unusual adjectives. Words such as lambent, nugatory and piacular definitely deserve to be let out more often!

It's not just adjectives that are examined in entertaining detail - every part of speech is covered. F'r instance how much do you know about definite and indefinite articles?

One of the things I've noticed when I edit work for people whose second language is English is that they have real problems using articles, and now I understand why this is so.

As Ben explains, "... by the age of four, native English speakers know in their bones the difference between 'I drank Coke,' 'I drank the Coke,' and 'I drank a Coke,' and the fact that you take a pass but the easy way out."

Can you imagine trying to learn these differences as an adult? It seems the problem is compounded (or alleviated) depending on the learner's native language. "Romanian, Macedonian, Swedish, and Aztec append the definite article to the back of a noun, and Arabic to the front ... Swahili and Latin rarely use articles of any kind. ... Polish, Russian, and Japanese are article-less as well. Arabic, Welsh, and Esperanto have definite articles but no indefinite articles. In French and German, the definite article is applied to proper nouns and the names of abstractions and classes of things ..."

Aargh!

Which brings us neatly to interjections ...

And so the book is filled with such interesting details about language that you'll find yourself carrying it from room to room as you go about your chores, loath to put it down ... Or is that only me?

The author takes readers on an informative and often entertaining walk through Fowler and Follett territory, contemporary usage. Neither a strict prescriptivist nor a lax descriptivist, Yagoda has good things to say about some much maligned current uses of "like," and some delightfully nasty ones about such a locution as "Mom." What distinguishes his presentation, and is evident throughout, is his middle-of-the-road sweet reasonableness. If his book has a limitation, though, I'd say it's the problem of his reiterating the obvious. That adverbs and adjectives can rob verbs of power or tumble into redundancy, that overuse of prepositions or triple and quadruple noun compounds will make prose bureaucratic and opaque, that verbs are the most important words in a language or a good prose style - none of these principles is exactly a revelation at this late date. Nevertheless, if it's true that people more often than not need to be reminded of essentials, Yagoda's book will serve a useful as well as entertaining purpose.

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