Semicolonoscopy

Kurt Vonnegut called semicolons “transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college.” As a college grad, let me just say that semicolons aren’t really that complicated (far less so than being a transvestite hermaphrodite, I bet), despite how often they’re misused. Use semicolons in the following two cases: Case 1: Between two closely related independent clauses (meaning each clause could stand alone as sentence) that you want to bind closer together than they would be with periods or if you used “and,” “but,” or, “yet.” Fabiola went to the frock shop. It was closed. Fabiola went to the frock shop, but it was closed. Fabiola went to the frock shop; it was closed. Case 2: In a series – semicolons can be substituted for commas in a series when one of the items in the series itself contains other punctuation. (Otherwise, always use commas in a series.) Yasmin was supposed to buy Slaughterhouse-Five, published in 1969; Cat’s Cradle, published in 1963; and Breakfast of Champions, published in 1973. Instead, she went to Neiman-Marcus and bought a pair of mules, which she clearly did not need; boots, which she would wear when hiking in the Hindu Kush; and black Maryjanes, perfect for her flamenco class. Each of the items within the series above includes its own comma, so dividing the items themselves with a comma would be confusing. In this case, semicolons are used as item dividers. If the “published in” phrases weren’t there in the first sentence, for instance, it would simply have been “Yasmin was supposed to buy Slaughterhouse-Five, Cat’s Cradle, and Breakfast of Champions.

Comments

[Sean]

Semi-colon is a funny word. Get it?

[Loren]

As the bloggers brother, I wish to credit him with a fun and provocative blog. I just wish the author would allow me, a photographer of considerable---okay, miniscule---renown, to re-shoot his portrait. It's too darn...jovial.

Loren