Question regarding the compound sentence

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Verbal

Here's how brave I am, I'll show you the actual sentence. Maybe the mods can tell me no in advance. "He maintained his cool while he stood in the cramped workmanlike efficiency of his supervisor’s office, getting chewed out by a guy who used to be his best friend; he held his composure in the supervisor’s supervisor’s office as well, the imposing corner office with the large windows and the unused leather furniture set in the corner; he even kept it together while cleaning out his desk, as his coworkers stopped by one by one to say good-bye."

Well I would put a comma after 'cramped' and another between 'supervisor's' and 'supervisor's office', also one after 'unused'. I'd also put one before and after 'one by one'.
'Maintained his cool' and 'held his composure' are the same thing, one of them is superfluous. And I would seperate the sentences.

I'll probably get shot down for this

10 Jan 2015

Quote by dpw

Quote by Verbal
Here's how brave I am, I'll show you the actual sentence. Maybe the mods can tell me no in advance. "He maintained his cool while he stood in the cramped workmanlike efficiency of his supervisor’s office, getting chewed out by a guy who used to be his best friend; he held his composure in the supervisor’s supervisor’s office as well, the imposing corner office with the large windows and the unused leather furniture set in the corner; he even kept it together while cleaning out his desk, as his coworkers stopped by one by one to say good-bye."

Well I would put a comma after 'cramped' and another between 'supervisor's' and 'supervisor's office', also one after 'unused'. I'd also put one before and after 'one by one'.
'Maintained his cool' and 'held his composure' are the same thing, one of them is superfluous. And I would seperate the sentences.

I'll probably get shot down for this

Consider yourself at least partially shot down ;)

Two rules of thumb: only put a comma between consecutive adjectives if you could change their order without impacting the meaning. Posessive determiners are never followed by a comma.

The comma between "cramped" and "workmanlike" is a bit of a gray area and depends on how fixed of an expression you see in "workmanlike efficiency". There's no question about the "supervisor's", see above. The one after "unused" is a no go, as "unused" is the adjective and "leather furniture" the noun. The commas around "one by one" are optional. Without commas, the expression takes the place of a plain adverb, whereas the commas turn it into something of an afterthought (proclaiming that it had originally been at the end of the sentence and moved forward.)

10 Jan 2015

Quote by ChrissieLecker

Consider yourself at least partially shot down ;)

Two rules of thumb: only put a comma between consecutive adjectives if you could change their order without impacting the meaning. Posessive determiners are never followed by a comma.

The comma between "cramped" and "workmanlike" is a bit of a gray area and depends on how fixed of an expression you see in "workmanlike efficiency". There's no question about the "supervisor's", see above. The one after "unused" is a no go, as "unused" is the adjective and "leather furniture" the noun. The commas around "one by one" are optional. Without commas, the expression takes the place of a plain adverb, whereas the commas turn it into something of an afterthought (proclaiming that it had originally been at the end of the sentence and moved forward.)

Surely leather is an adjective, it describes the furniture.
As regards 'one by one', I'd say it would be at the beginning of the sentence followed by a comma.

10 Jan 2015

Quote by dpw

Surely leather is an adjective, it describes the furniture.
As regards 'one by one', I'd say it would be at the beginning of the sentence followed by a comma.

"leather" is a noun. "leathery" is its adjective.

"one by one" is a modifier that, depending on how you look at it, further refines either the verb (describes how they stopped by) or the whole of the image described in the sentence, so its both semantically and syntactically correct position would either be next to the verb or at the very end. It could only have its natural position at the beginning of the sentence if it modified the subject, which it doesn't. That you'd (correctly) put a comma after it means that you'd stick in a flag that says, "Non-standard structure here, beware!"

10 Jan 2015

Quote by dpw

Surely leather is an adjective, it describes the furniture.
As regards 'one by one', I'd say it would be at the beginning of the sentence followed by a comma.

I haven't read this entire, shockingly spirited thread about grammar (wow!) but my leather couch agrees that it's an adjective. :P

As far as those loooong sentences, they exhaust the reader. A good rule of thumb is that if you read it aloud and run out of breath in the middle, it's too long. Thank you for changing that, Verbal.

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Delphi
I haven't read this entire, shockingly spirited thread about grammar (wow!) but my leather couch agrees that it's an adjective. :P

Sorry to object here. It's an attributive noun or noun adjunct, not an adjective. You can't say "my couch is leather" like you could with a true adjective, let's say, "my couch is soft." It can't be separated from the noun it modifies, and it doesn't want a comma after a preceding adjective.

10 Jan 2015

Quote by ChrissieLecker

"leather" is a noun. "leathery" is its adjective.

"one by one" is a modifier that, depending on how you look at it, further refines either the verb (describes how they stopped by) or the whole of the image described in the sentence, so its both semantically and syntactically correct position would either be next to the verb or at the very end. It could only have its natural position at the beginning of the sentence if it modified the subject, which it doesn't. That you'd (correctly) put a comma after it means that you'd stick in a flag that says, "Non-standard structure here, beware!"

'One by one' is an aside or subordinate clause.
If you want leather furniture to be a noun/ subject it should be hyphenated.

10 Jan 2015

This is a great thread!

Click here for Head

10 Jan 2015

Quote by ChrissieLecker

Sorry to object here. It's an attributive noun or noun adjunct, not an adjective. You can't say "my couch is leather" like you could with a true adjective, let's say, "my couch is soft." It can't be separated from the noun it modifies, and it doesn't want a comma after a preceding adjective.

I won't pretend I know the ins and outs of the English language (I don't!), but I did look at the websters dictionary, which defined it as an adjective. I think you might have a firmer grasp on the details, but I'm an extremely basic English kind of girl. Embarassed

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Delphi
I won't pretend I know the ins and outs of the English language (I don't!), but I did look at the websters dictionary, which defined it as an adjective. I think you might have a firmer grasp on the details, but I'm an extremely basic English kind of girl.

Hm. Time to upgrade my dictionary then, as it knows it only as a noun and verb. I stand corrected.

10 Jan 2015

From 'A Writer's Reference', "When a coordinating conjunction connects two or more independent clauses, a comma must precede it."
"Exception: If the two independent clauses are short and there is no danger of misreading, the comma may be omitted."

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Delphi

I haven't read this entire, shockingly spirited thread about grammar (wow!) but my leather couch agrees that it's an adjective. :P

As far as those loooong sentences, they exhaust the reader. A good rule of thumb is that if you read it aloud and run out of breath in the middle, it's too long. Thank you for changing that, Verbal.

You are welcome, Delphi. I am clearly the only person who thinks I should keep it all in one sentence smile

. That said, there are many long sentences in the story (in all my stories, it's a stylistic tic), and I think most of them are justified. We shall see.... Be kind, dear mods.

I am enjoying the discussion of commas too, but will stay out of it, for fear I've hijacked this thread too much already.

10 Jan 2015

Quote by BadDog9
From 'A Writer's Reference', "When a coordinating conjunction connects two or more independent clauses, a comma must precede it."
"Exception: If the two independent clauses are short and there is no danger of misreading, the comma may be omitted."

Yes, interesting thesis.

I have seen short compound sentences where the comma looks optional.

I like the sound of this. I must say the logic is very persuasive.

Well done. thumbright

10 Jan 2015

Quote by ChrissieLecker
Ah, but this is a wholly different school of fish. "But couldn't" is not an independent clause. There's one rule of thumb that applies almost universally:

Never separate a subject from its verb.

The subject (He) belongs to both the first clause (tried to stop) and the second clause (but couldn't). Look at the comma as an unnecessary hurdle for the second verb to reach its subject.

Hmm, I don't quite agree with this. What if I take that one sentence out of its context ("He tried to stop but couldn't."), and rewrite it as such:

"He tried to stop, but he could never achieve it."

Here, "but he could never achieve it" is a legit independent clause; "but couldn't" simply is a stripped-down version of it.

And concerning the 'Never separate a subject from its verb' part, I believe that in this instance it is simply a case of 'pronoun omission'. Similar to the sentence:

"I often express my opinion vehemently, but try to keep it to myself when I'm talking to my boss."

The fact that a comma can be removed has nothing to do with how 'the subject has to reach its verb'; in my last example, the use of a comma is perfectly acceptable (and even recommended), even if I omitted the pronoun 'I' before the verb 'try'. When a comma can be removed, it has to do with the presence of a short sentence where a pause is not really necessary to distinguish clauses, as BadDog9 suggested:

Quote by BadDog9

From 'A Writer's Reference', "When a coordinating conjunction connects two or more independent clauses, a comma must precede it."
"Exception: If the two independent clauses are short and there is no danger of misreading, the comma may be omitted."

One could argue about what qualifies a clause as being 'short' though. In one of my previous responses to Verbal, I actually had an hesitation with one specific comma:

"Your three sentences all start with 'He' followed by a verb, so they're still closely related, even with the use of periods, and the reader fully understands that this is a succession of actions."

Here, I could have omitted the comma before 'so', as such:

"Your three sentences all start with 'He' followed by a verb so they're still closely related, even with the use of periods, and the reader fully understands that this is a succession of actions."

The clause "so they're still closely related" is a relatively short one, and there's no danger of misreading. As well, with the many pauses created by the adverbial clause "even with the use of periods", that omission can make the whole sentence more fluid and easier to read. This is a case where the use of a comma is entirely the choice of the writer.

10 Jan 2015

And here's a fun parenthesis addressed to those who tend to take 'rules' a bit too seriously...

If you ever read one of those 'Learn How to Play Guitar' books, every one of them will insist about how your thumb should always remain behind the neck, as such:

Now, browse for pictures of Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix. Come on, Google them and see for yourself. Notice anything special?

Conclusion: Your goal should be to master your art, and not obsessively matter about the rules that must be followed or not. Fuck rules! L16

10 Jan 2015

Quote by SereneProdigy
And here's a fun parenthesis addressed to those who tend to take 'rules' a bit too seriously...

If you ever read one of those 'Learn How to Play Guitar' books, every one of them will mention how your thumb should always remain behind the neck, as such:

Now, browse for pictures of Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix. Come on, Google them and see for yourself. Notice anything special?

Conclusion: Your goal should be to master your art, and not obsessively matter about the rules that must be followed or not. Fuck rules!

Yes, this is a good point.

Hendrix did use his thumb over the neck to fret the bottom E (in standard tuning) to reach bassy notes while playing higher ones too.

Check out a song of his called Little Wing. It really is fantastic.

10 Jan 2015

Quote by SereneProdigy
Conclusion: Your goal should be to master your art, and not obsessively matter about the rules that must be followed or not. Fuck rules!

You could play the guitar by slapping the strings with your nut sack if you wanted to. As long as the sound was right it wouldn't matter. The written word is a bit different.

There are rules when it comes to writing. Some of them can be bent for artistic effect, others should be adhered to.

(As for the thumb thing, it looks to me like Eric is playing D chords in both of those photos. I hook my thumb over to mute the E and A strings when I play those, lots of guitarists do as a bit of a cheat. Never seen that in a book.)

@Lizerotica

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Liz
You could play the guitar by slapping the strings with your nut sack if you wanted to. As long as the sound was right it wouldn't matter. The written word is a bit different.

There are rules when it comes to writing. Some of them can be bent for artistic effect, others should be adhered to.

(As for the thumb thing, it looks to me like Eric is playing D chords in both of those photos. I hook my thumb over to mute the E and A strings when I play those, lots of guitarists do as a bit of a cheat. Never seen that in a book.)

Yay! Let's totally threadjack this topic to guitar playing! L46

But I kinda disagree about "There are rules when it comes to writing. Some of them can be bent for artistic effect, others should be adhered to."

Well, yes and no. Rules are there to provide you some guidelines about how to master your art effectively, but your main goal should always be to get skillful and proficient at it, no matter what: some authors actually wrote entire books in a 'slang' language, to achieve a very specific style. Again, adherence to rules can help you achieve your goals, but they're only a means to an end.

And here's another fun 'broken rule' in a popular guitar riff (Back in Black, from AC/DC). If you look at that part of the riff at 3:05 (where bass notes are played with the ring/pinky fingers), this is actually a chromatic scale, without any intervals between the notes. Not very popular/recommended usually, but hey, that album sold 50 million copies:

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Liz

You could play the guitar by slapping the strings with your nut sack if you wanted to. As long as the sound was right it wouldn't matter. The written word is a bit different.

There are rules when it comes to writing. Some of them can be bent for artistic effect, others should be adhered to.

(As for the thumb thing, it looks to me like Eric is playing D chords in both of those photos. I hook my thumb over to mute the E and A strings when I play those, lots of guitarists do as a bit of a cheat. Never seen that in a book.)

Liz, you are wise beyond your years and have a wonderful sense of humour.

I'm wondering if anyone has ever tried slapping guitar strings with their nut sack. Quite brilliant. notworthy

I wish I had thought of that.

Yes, I must agree, playing guitar and the written word are completely different things and should be treated as such.

10 Jan 2015

A bit of a non-sequitur here, but I've been trying to "pimp my profile" so to speak.

I cited a quote from Omar Khayyam on my profile page and have no idea whether it is a quote or a poem.

Any advice would be appreciated.

10 Jan 2015

Quote by Liz

You could play the guitar by slapping the strings with your nut sack if you wanted to. As long as the sound was right it wouldn't matter. The written word is a bit different.

There are rules when it comes to writing. Some of them can be bent for artistic effect, others should be adhered to.

(As for the thumb thing, it looks to me like Eric is playing D chords in both of those photos. I hook my thumb over to mute the E and A strings when I play those, lots of guitarists do as a bit of a cheat. Never seen that in a book.)

I have been playing guitar since the age of ten, and I'm sure Mr. Clapton is the playing the D minor 7 chord.

If you look closely at the first image you'll see he is barring the top E and B string with his forefinger on the first fret, whilst his middle finger is fingering the G string on the second fret. This, combined with the fact he is muting the bottom E with his thumb, must mean he is playing the D minor 7 chord.

I don't wish to be a bother, but I am a very keen guitarist and love writing my own material.

11 Jan 2015

In the context of a leather sofa, leather is a noun. A leather sofa is itself a thing, 'leather' doesn't qualify sofa it merely says what it is. I can't say leather can never be an adjective but leathery is the normal form.

A First Class Service Ch.5

A steamy lesbian three way

11 Jan 2015

Leather, as in "leather sofa" is most clearly an adjective. Yes, it does say what the sofa is just as "hot coffee" says what the coffee is. Words routinely change forms according to the context in which they're used.

The original sentence is a run-on. It's three perfectly good statements separated by semicolons which should be changed to periods.

11 Jan 2015

Quote by Frank_Lee
Leather, as in "leather sofa" is most clearly an adjective. Yes, it does say what the sofa is just as "hot coffee" says what the coffee is. Words routinely change forms according to the context in which they're used.

The original sentence is a run-on. It's three perfectly good statements separated by semicolons which should be changed to periods.

I see what you're saying, but for me an adjective is a word that describes a noun. Surely leather sofa is a type of sofa. If I said it's a brown leather sofa, then brown is an adjective describing the colour of the leather sofa?

A First Class Service Ch.5

A steamy lesbian three way

11 Jan 2015

I know you can go and find places on the internet where it says leather is an adjective, but I'm not convinced. Here's why:

According to the dictionaries I used for Uni, which is the great big Oxford dictionary in two volumes that weigh about 5kg each, leather can either be a substantive (which is a posh word for a noun) or a verb.

Nowhere does it say it's an adjective.

The way I see it, in the case of leather sofa or leather handbag leather is part of the essence of the thing. I get where people are coming from, so you start off with sofa, which is definitely a noun, so you're assuming that when you stick leather in the front it must be an adjective.

Imagine instead of a sofa it's a cow. What sort of cow? An Hereford cow. Hereford isn't an adjective is it. Leather is performing the same function grammatically as Hereford. A leather sofa is a sofa made of leather, a Hereford cow is a cow from Hereford.

A First Class Service Ch.5

A steamy lesbian three way

11 Jan 2015

Why isn't anyone replying to my posts?

I created this thread, so I think it's rather impertinent of you all to ignore me.

I have been ostracised all my life and thought, somewhat naively it seems, that people would be different on here.

I am an omnicompetent person who could be a great asset and make a real contribution to the site.

I can't, however, if people refuse to acknowledge me.

If you insist on omitting me from your group, that's fine. I shall just retreat into the background and be another humdrum run-of-the-mill member of your community.

That means I shan't be uploading any fantastic stories or starting any more great threads.

11 Jan 2015

Quote by tiddlywink
Why isn't anyone replying to my posts?

I created this thread, so I think it's rather impertinent of you all to ignore me.

I have been ostracised all my life and thought, somewhat naively it seems, that people would be different on here.

I am an omnicompetent person who could be a great asset and make a real contribution to the site.

I can't, however, if people refuse to acknowledge me.

If you insist on omitting me from your group, that's fine. I shall just retreat into the background and be another humdrum run-of-the-mill member of your community.

That means I shan't be uploading any fantastic stories or starting any more great threads.

Awwww Tigglywink, I'm not ignoring your posts, but threads have a way of going off at a tangent, so you might post something but then something else comes up. Is there anything on this thread you need an answer to or an opinion on? Danny xx

A First Class Service Ch.5

A steamy lesbian three way

11 Jan 2015

Quote by DanielleX
I know you can go and find places on the internet where it says leather is an adjective, but I'm not convinced. Here's why:

According to the dictionaries I used for Uni, which is the great big Oxford dictionary in two volumes that weigh about 5kg each, leather can either be a substantive (which is a posh word for a noun) or a verb.

Nowhere does it say it's an adjective.

The way I see it, in the case of leather sofa or leather handbag leather is part of the essence of the thing. I get where people are coming from, so you start off with sofa, which is definitely a noun, so you're assuming that when you stick leather in the front it must be an adjective.

Imagine instead of a sofa it's a cow. What sort of cow? An Hereford cow. Hereford isn't an adjective is it. Leather is performing the same function grammatically as Hereford. A leather sofa is a sofa made of leather, a Hereford cow is a cow from Hereford.

I have always used the OED as well. Anyone who loves language owes it to themselves to drink straight from the fountain, as it were. And I couldn't agree more that Google is not the best way to confirm style/mechanics questions. The information is often in conflict, and sometimes just totally out of left field.

I just go by the books and style guides I use for teaching this material and also when I'm editing for ebook publishers. If you look at your two versions of the sentence - brown vs leather sofa - the grammatical function of brown and leather is the same. The only possible function either word is performing is to modify sofa. And yes, Hereford would be an adjective in that context.

The OED is amazing, and will give you the entire etymology of a given word, but it's still a dictionary and not a grammar guide.

11 Jan 2015

Quote by DanielleX

Awwww Tigglywink, I'm not ignoring your posts, but threads have a way of going off at a tangent, so you might post something but then something else comes up. Is there anything on this thread you need an answer to or an opinion on? Danny xx

Thank you, Danny. That's very kind of you. hello1

I'm trying to "pimp my profile" so to speak. On my profile page, I cited a quotation from a poet and philosopher called "Omar Khayyam".

I'm not an expert on this, so I was wondering if anyone could give me an idea as to whether it's a quote or a poem.

Thank you for acknowledging me, Danny. You are kind, as well as clever. xxx

11 Jan 2015

Quote by tiddlywink
I have been playing guitar since the age of ten, and I'm sure Mr. Clapton is the playing the D minor 7 chord.

If you look closely at the first image you'll see he is barring the top E and B string with his forefinger on the first fret, whilst his middle finger is fingering the G string on the second fret. This, combined with the fact he is muting the bottom E with his thumb, must mean he is playing the D minor 7 chord.

I don't mean to be a bother, but I am a very keen guitarist and love writing my own material.

There girl, I'm going to reply to one of your posts. wave

Yes, it totally looks like a D7 in the first picture... not a Dm7 though. Look at these chords:

First, if you move the F# to a F on the first string, it changes the chord from a D to a Dm. Then, if you move the D to a C on the second string, it changes the chord from a D to a D7. If you combine both, you change the chord from a D to a Dm7.

The Dm7 chord is quite rare; I don't remember ever playing it in a song. The D, Dm and D7 chords are much more common.

And I'm not quite sure that Clapton is using his thumb to mute the two upper strings; personally I have absolutely no problem hitting just the first 4 strings, I don't need to mute any string.

I can also hit only the 4 central strings fairly easily in Dominant 7th chords (bluesy chords), which you can move all around the neck:

If you Google pictures of Clapton, he almost always has his thumb over the neck of his guitar; it doesn't really serve any specific function, it's simply more comfortable/efficient for him.