/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.7086946]

>semi-colons

[Anonymous No.7086957]

>>7086946
I often feel they're necessary but I almost always misuse them; sometimes I succeed.

I've heard that a good rule is that you should only use them if you could fit 'however' in

[Anonymous No.7086967]

>>7086957
How does that "however" rule work?

In any case, is there a more fedora type of punctuation?

[Anonymous No.7086977]

>>7086967
I mean, by themselves, possibly, though there are very obscure ones that may qualify, e.g. the rhetorical question mark.
But they're often very subtle in the act of going through the text anyway that it doesn't often matter.

[Anonymous No.7086992]

>>7086977
>>7086967
Well when something feels right you want to do it

Don't take this as gospel truth because I was told a long time ago, but I recall hearing that any sentence using a semicolon should be able to contain the comma-however-semicolon. As so:

"OP was a faggot, however; his faggotry knew no bounds"

As opposed to

"OP was a faggot, however; despite his protests of denial"


I don't believe that covers all usages though, clauses, lists and all that bullshit.

[Anonymous No.7087012]

>>7086992
oh god why

[Anonymous No.7087022]

>>7087012
It's been a long time since I've been educated on grammar

rude

[Anonymous No.7087134]

An inability to recognise their value is a sign of illiteracy tbh.

While it's true that they're not necessary in the kind of sentences that most people read and use in their everyday lives, semi-colons do add a lot of clarity once you start to handle lengthier, more complex sentences with heavy branching, co-ordination, etc. In such instances where they are useful, to convey the exact same thing without semi-colons would require breaking the flow of the sentence and adding a bunch of filler words to ensure that the new independent clauses remained grammatical.

[Anonymous No.7087153]

>>7086946
top pleb

[Anonymous No.7087168]

>>7086992
that's not how you use it.

[Anonymous No.7087169]

>>7086946
>being american

do not bother learning this and continue to destroy the english syntax.

just do what other murifats do

>use space instead of comma

>use comma instead of semi-colon

>use comma instead of long dash

[Anonymous No.7087175]

>>7086946
you use it to show relation between two main clauses, instead of putting a full stop in there. it replaces every conjunction except 'or' where a full stop would prevent the relation to be fully shown and where a comma would create comma splice.

[Anonymous No.7087306]

Semicolons are distracting and unnecessary in short sentences, but almost necessary in longer sentences – long sentences with no semicolons can be quite hard to read, whereas ones with semicolons no more difficult than short sentences.

[Anonymous No.7087312]

I was always told the semicolon connected two dependent clauses with a common objective.
>>7086992 is basically a faggot trying to act smart.

[Anonymous No.7087314]

>>7086957
You've just got to feel it out. There are no actual rules, man. When you start getting to a kind of educational parity with your professors, you'll twig to that; if it looks right, and it's used confidently, it's no foul.

[Anonymous No.7087316]

>>7086946
Semi-colons can be vital in long, complicated, lists.

>inb4: don't write long complicated lists to start with

[Anonymous No.7087324]

>>7087169
There is no such thing as 'ruining' a language. Grammar, syntax and pronunciation are done by consensus.

[Anonymous No.7087335]

Why are people so afraid of the semicolon?

Even in lists?

"We went all around Europe: Paris, to see the Louvre and Eiffel tower; Amsterdam, 420 blaze it; Venice, which smelled like shit, and everyone there was yelling and they couldn't drive a boat right to save their lives; Greece, because my hubby kept saying "start with the Greeks," but it made more economical sense to start in Paris anyways; and finally Russia, where I poked a bear in a cage with a stick,and some young men kept yelling "niggery idti domoy," oh, I don't know what that means but it sounded so nice; everyone was so nice, what a wonderful trip!"

There is nothing "snobby," "elitist," "obfuscatory," or "unnecessarily verbose," about that sentence.

[Anonymous No.7087343]

>>7087134
Better to write more directly. I rarely follow this advice because most of my sentences wind up as tangles of clauses and commas.

[Anonymous No.7087346]

>>7087312
I go by this or lists.

[Anonymous No.7087349]

>>7087335
One of the few places they are acceptable tbh. I'd rather the average anglophone reorganize their sentences and speak more directly.

[Anonymous No.7087571]

>>7087335
It's not fear. I just don't like long, extravagant sentences punctuated by them.

[Anonymous No.7087813]

>>7087169
This.
And fuck you, OP. I love semicolons.
(Notice I resisted the temptation to use a semicolon in my post)

[Anonymous No.7087838]

I hate it when people, take the subject away from the verb with a comma.
No matter how often they do it, I'll never accept it.

[Anonymous No.7087839]

>he()doesn't()use()interstices

[Anonymous No.7087904]

I remember using my first semi-colon. I must have been roughly 14-15 years old when my English teacher called me out in class for using one in a piece of work; as it happened it was the correct place to use one however I could never be certain of their proper use.

I love both using and reading long, flowing sentences yet they can often become unclear; with this in mind I began to shorten my sentences for work: a solution I now deem unsatisfactory having rediscovered the semi-colon.

That said, I find it difficult to know when to use colons. I've noticed for instance, Cervantes, using colons and semi-colons in some of his longer sentences, even when the sentence is not structured as a list. Is one able to use multiple semi-colons within the same sentence?

[Anonymous No.7087910]

>>7087838
>I hate it when people, take the subject away from the verb with a comma.
me too

This is poor syntax and, of course, people do not reflect on how they communicate. Pure selfishness.

[Anonymous No.7087941]

>>7087904
>Didn't use semicolon in a textbook example
>Semicolon followed by colon (not a mistake but damn it breaks flow)
>Comma after Cervantes
Triggered

[Anonymous No.7087963]

>>7086957
>>7086992
Whoever told you this is incredibly wrong: don't listen to anything else he/she has to say about grammar. You should use semicolons to show a relation between two clauses (by this I mean that they have the same subject, direct object, etc), to display a contrast between two clauses, or to separate items in a list that are long or contain commas themselves. While you can put can pair an adverb with a semicolon, the adverb should be after the semicolon and the adverb should be separated by the following clause with a comma.

[Anonymous No.7087984]

>>semi-colons
>not semicolons

Lose the hyphen, pal.

[Anonymous No.7088045]

>all of the people in this thread who have no clue how to use a semicolon
If you don't know with complete certainty how to use every single mainstream punctuation mark, leave immediately and don't come back until you know how to use all punctuation correctly: I doubt anyone who doesn't understand why I used a colon could contribute to this board.

[Anonymous No.7088061]

>>7088045
While we're on it, how about people who misuse quotation marks, "for emphasis?"

[Anonymous No.7088100]

I don't really care about super strict rules of grammar in writing, what matters is how it flows when you read it; like apostrophes are a short pause and semicolons are sort of a longer pause (I tried to do it there). After reading the oxford world classics version of brothers karamazov which uses single quote marks for dialogue for some reason (because its all a story told by a townsman?) ive stopped caring. that shit was just too much, plus Dosto uses semicolons like a mad man. (ive been awake for 48 hours and im trippin MAD ballz on 40 mg adderall does it show in my post?? (lol funny post funny guy hes high on drugs haha))

[Anonymous No.7088101]

>>7088061
People do that? That disgusts me. How hard is it to remember the rules of something so important?

[Anonymous No.7088111]

A ; is used for a suspense pause

[Anonymous No.7088126]

>>7088045

lol you used a fucking colon get out now

[Anonymous No.7088134]

>>7088045
You misused '>', I doubt you can contribute to this board.

[Anonymous No.7088154]

>>7088100
>what matters is how it flows when you read it; like apostrophes are a short pause and semicolons are sort of a longer pause (I tried to do it there)
This might be okay for conveying speech in writing, but otherwise something like this will often compromise the confidence the reader has in what they're reading.

[Anonymous No.7088156]

>>7088101
Yeah, my former boss and many clients would do it all the fucking time. They even requested I do it in their advertisements.

Also, someone I used to know would always use quotes for emphasis on his Facebook posts, and when me and others enlightened him and explained that it makes everything he says seem sarcastic, he got huffy and said that everybody makes grammatical mistakes, and went right on doing it again.

The businesspeople doing it bothers me the most, though. You would be horrified at how poorly they communicate in e-mails.

[Anonymous No.7088172]

when I was in highschool my English teacher said that semi-colons are used to denote that the two sentences before and after the semi-colon are linked in some way, or you use them to separate items in a list when one or more of the items in the list requires the use of commas.

[Anonymous No.7088178]

fuck
I thought that the semi colon is used when you like want to combine to use of the comma and the colon

[Anonymous No.7088180]

>>7086967
>In any case, is there a more fedora type of punctuation?

Golden shit post.

[Anonymous No.7088202]

What are the rules nowadays for putting commas between each adjective preceding a noun?

I was taught to write in that way, and in many cases using classic words and simple sentence structures it still feels correct to write in that way, but when writing colloquially or using modern terms it often feels awkward or unnatural or forced to separate each describing term preceding a noun with a comma.

Does anyone else know what I mean?

[Anonymous No.7088217]

The use of commas and periods is a fool's game; only a pauper unversed in the crafting and smithing of words would stoop to such a level - I fear a great many of my pears suffer from this disability: a facet of their writing I have noticed often; they lack the finesse of finer writers such as myself and as such I will now list the errors of their ways: they are despondent to literature; many of them were truants; they prefer to eat marijuana flapjacks rather than find work and; your a cuck.

[Anonymous No.7088241]

>>7086946
i like em, they're like a ironically sincere middle finger to the world

[Anonymous No.7088245]

>>7088202
No, write a sentence as an example

[Anonymous No.7088252]

they're for pretentious snobs

like capitalizing the first word of a sentence or ending your sentences in periods

[Anonymous No.7088262]

>>7088241
>i like em, they're like a ironically sincere middle finger to the world

I'm not sure what that means but it sounds edgy and faggoty.

[Anonymous No.7088264]

>>7088202
>What are the rules nowadays for putting commas between each adjective preceding a noun?
the english language shows its stupidity right there

so go back to roman languages
noun +adj1, adj2, adj3, ...

[Anonymous No.7088272]

>>7088264
reminder that noun+noun is not proper english [unless you are the typical scum from the middle class]

[Anonymous No.7088342]

>>7088245
I think he means this:

>Anon returned to his barren, isolated hotel room.
as opposed to
>Anon retuned to his barren isolated hotel room

Am I right, >>7088202 ?

[Anonymous No.7088354]

>>7088045
Except you didn't use that colon correctly. You should have used a full stop/period instead.

Unless you actually used the colon incorrectly deliberately as a means of shitposting and/or b8ing

In which case you do have something to contribute to this stupid fucking board

[Anonymous No.7088470]

>>7086992

no, it'd be "OP was a faggot; his mouth was never devoid of cocks, he pleased old men for money, and his faggotry knew no bounds."

[Anonymous No.7088481]

>>7088061
>implying

[Anonymous No.7088512]

>>7086992
Both your examples are wrong. You're a megaretard.

[Anonymous No.7088520]

How does /lit/ feel about hyphens? I use them suckas all the time!

[Anonymous No.7088526]

A good(and acceptable use of semicolon):

OP is a faggot: he sucks dicks everyday; he loves posting on a tibetan yak breeding image board; he's a virgin; and he's never getting laid.

Another good use is when you are listing things that contain commas. When you're trying to improve run on sentences.

It's grossly misused though. go on reddit and count the wrong semicolons.

[Anonymous No.7088602]

>>7088354
The last clause explains the first, so the colon is correct. Do they not teach you that in your country?

[ᆧ No.7089067]

>>7087335
>"niggery idti domoy,"
kek

[Anonymous No.7089483]

>>7087312
You mean independent clauses.

[Anonymous No.7089520]

>>7088045
>I doubt anyone who doesn't understand why I'm about to use a colon could contribute to this board: if you don't know with complete certainty how to use every single mainstream punctuation mark, leave immediately and don't come back until you know how to use all punctuation correctly.

I've fixed your fuck-up, please leave now.

[Anonymous No.7089598]

>>7089520
While it was a loose usage, the original wasn't wrong, dingus. The clause "I doubt anyone who doesn't understand why I used a colon could contribute to this board" directly explains why I said that people who aren't familiar with grammar should leave, and, based on every single website, textbook, and English professor ever, colons can be used to separate a clause from one that directly explains it. The way you used a colon in the arrangement was different because, instead of explaining the previous clause, the new last clause acts as a solution to the issue prompted by the first. In other words, the way I used the colon was like using the word "because", while the way you used it was like using the word "so". I would appreciate it if you left now.

[Anonymous No.7089625]

hating semicolons is literally reddit: the grammatical opinion

[Anonymous No.7091217]

ok

[Anonymous No.7092096]

>>7088262
i swear people on this board just say edgy rather than admit their own ignorance

[Anonymous No.7092119]

>>7086946
I don't think there is one semi-colon in Gravity's Rainbow or Blood Meridian to my recollection.