Abraham Lincoln Quotes

I would die at the stake rather than change a semi-colon!

A comma . . . catches the gentle drift of the mind in thought, turning in on itself and back on itself, reversing, redoubling, and returning along the course of its own sweet river music; while the semicolon brings clauses and thoughts together with all the silent discretion of a hostess arranging guests around her dinner table.

I don't think, in my entire 18 years as a student, I ever used an exclamation point in an academic paper.

Punctuation, is? fun!

It is almost always a greater pleasure to come across a semicolon than a period. The period tells you that that is that; if you didn't get all the meaning you wanted or expected, anyway you got all the writer intended to parcel out and now you have to move along. But with a semicolon there you get a pleasant little feeling of expectancy; there is more to come; read on; it will get clearer.

It's always nice to end your sentences with an exclamation mark, and not a comma.

In true prose everything must be underlined.

I like commas. I detest semi-colons - I don't think they belong in a story. And I gave up quotation marks long ago. I found I didn't need them, they were fly-specks on the page.

Sometimes with 'The New Yorker,' they have grammar rules that just don't feel right in my mouth.

I am not a grammarian. Maybe my style is eccentric.

I used to enjoy using dots where they would be least expected, not at the end of a sentence but in the middle, creating the effect... of a skipped beat. It seemed to me the mind reacted - first!... in dots, dashes, and exclamation points, then rationalized, drew up a brief, with periods.

I'm pretty sure when I need a comma; I'm not so sure about a semicolon.

Thurber was asked by a correspondent: "Why did you have a comma in the sentence, 'After dinner, the men went into the living-room'?" And his answer was probably one of the loveliest things ever said about punctuation. "This particular comma," Thurber explained, "was Ross's way of giving the men time to push back their chairs and stand up.

Semicolons . . . signal, rather than shout, a relationship. . . . A semicolon is a compliment from the writer to the reader. It says: "I don't have to draw you a picture; a hint will do."

No one complains of the rules of Grammar as fettering Language; because it is understood that correct use is not founded on Grammar, but Grammar on correct use. A just system of Logic or of Rhetoric is analogous, in this respect, to Grammar.

Grammar is the grave of letters.

Prose writers are interested mostly in life and commas.

No matter what any of the grammar teachers say, punctuation is an arbitrary matter. It should be used to make sentences clear.

The censure of frequent and long parentheses has led writers into the preposterous expedient of leaving out the marks by which they are indicated. It is no cure to a lame man to take away his crutches.

Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college.

Here is a les­son in writ­ing. First rule: Do not use semi­colons. They are trans­ves­tite her­maph­ro­dites rep­re­sent­ing absolutely noth­ing. All they do is show you've been to col­lege.

Keep your exclamation points under control. You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose.

Damn the subjunctive. It brings all our writers to shame.

One thing that drives me nuts... well, let me ask you, when writers write do they not use quotation marks anymore?

One should never use exclamation points in writing. It is like laughing at your own joke.