Q. According to CMOS, what is the correct way of stating the following: “I often wish” or “I wish often?”
Q. Which formation is more correct, “the information requested” or “the requested information”?
Questions like this to the online Q&A at the Chicago Manual of Style used to get me riled. What is behind this mania for “correctness”? This belief that there is but a single correct way to write something? I could only conclude that the writers had been traumatized by teachers whose rules were endless, iron-clad, and in large part imaginary. Brutes who would pen an angry F on any paper containing a sentence with more than eleven words in it and ban this blog for its sentence fragments.
But at some point it occurred to me that English might be the writers’ second language. In that light, instead of ignorant or annoying, such questions reveal themselves to be sophisticated and subtle and (quite frankly) beyond my ability to answer them properly. Issues like the placement of adjectives and adverbs are cruelly difficult to justify in English. How would we ever learn to say “six big red apples” instead of “big red six apples,” if we didn’t pick it up by ear as tots?
Not being a linguist or grammar expert (in case you had any illusions about that), I browsed online and learned something: It seems that linguists have long studied sequencing, but they continue to be challenged by its intricacies. Although word order is determined by categories (e.g., size, then shape, then color), attempts at mapping the categories have yet to accurately predict actual usage beyond the basics.*
If native speakers of English can be paralyzed by choices like those in the questions above, I can well imagine the difficulties faced by those still learning. Seeking that level of refinement and, yes, “correctness,” in another language is only to be admired.
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*For an example of recent research, see Robert Truswell, “Attributive Adjectives and Nominal Templates,” Linguistic Inquiry 40, no. 3 (Summer 2009): 525–33
Photo via Peakpx.
There are subtle differences. I often wish for the stars. I wish often, almost daily, for the stars. The last sentence seems to indicate more urgency, needing a qualifier to make more sense, while the first, seems more casual – a throw away line if you will.
Just a copy-editing note: watch your subject-verb agreement!
“Although word order is determined by categories (e.g., size, then shape, then color), attempts at mapping the categories ***has*** yet to accurately predict actual usage beyond the basics.”
(Fixed!) Thanks, Cat(?).
I’m glad you raised the point. A great deal of English-language business material originates from people whose first language is not English. When you edit them, they often want to know why you have made changes, and it can be very hard to explain the nuances of changes in syntax. Any help from CMOS is appreciated.
Another thing I’ve noticed is pushback on American typographical conventions, which are not always logical and are often at odds with European conventions. Just this morning I was considering writing a page on common differences to send to clients BEFORE I begin editing and we get into the why-did-you-delete-those-spaces discussion.
Well, yes, but . . . jeez. Do people no longer bother to be surprised and delighted when Subversive’s answer is 3 times as thoughtful and tactful and charming than the question leads us (well, me) to expect? Are we just that used it, now?
AS the question, damnit. Oh–look at that! Preview, it offered me. Aw-w, man.
George, you are so adorable.
Yeah, well. The unexpected side trip into linguistics was fun, and your stuff is always worth our attention, and it seemed worthwhile to work up a way of saying thanks that would be worth yours. But while I was hammily tugging at my forelock and all I was screwing up my mash note–more than once. I just now saw my missing TO–used TO it. Lord! Next time I’ll see if I can achieve simple and straightforward. Maybe even concise.