With a nickname of "Susie Comma" as editor of my high school magazine and a still unvanquished affinity for semicolons, I am the last to point a dainty digit at others. However, if I were to write a book about punctuation I would at least make sure it was correct. I believe, as you say, that it is the manner in which it is presented that is the selling point; in fact, the "Miss Manners" tongue-in-cheek repartee that makes it a must-have for the chic coffee table.

I have not read the book but I must admit to a certain sympathy with her reaction to "Book's".

I have similar reactions to "it's" used improperly. See the UseNet newsgroup "alt.possessive.its.has.no.apostrophe" for others who wince at such blasphemy.

You know, I got all excited that there was a best-selling book about punctuation, picked it up, leafed through it, and was....really disappointed by the writing style and the elementary nature of what she writes about. I so wish that The Deluxe Transitive Vampire: The Ultimate Handbook of Grammar for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed by Karen Elizabeth Gordon got one-half the publicity instead, because that's a book that's actually fun to read.

I'll have to take a look at it.

Truss was a humour columnist before writing a sports column (in fact, it was on that basis that she was given the sports brief; the newspaper wanted humour injected into the column. Whether or not she knew anything about sport was a secondary consideration.) She's also written a couple of comic novels.

Ditto with the book on punctuation. The publishers cared not a jot whether she knew whereof she spoke. They noted that her 'light' touch moved papers and books.

Such are the ways of publication these days; always have been, I guess. I note with alarm that Bill Bryson's next subject is Shakespeare.

Oh man that's depressing. (Commas deliberately omitted, either in homage to or in defiance of Truss, take your pick.) I guess I should blame not her but her publisher, then -- I don't expect anyone to turn down a paycheck.

Also not having read the book, I agree with hat that it's a terrible book, but having read Menand's review, I thought that it was pretty bad too. It seems to me that he could have dispatched Truss in a third the space, and some of the stuff he said seemed like padding. He who lives by the word, dies by the word.

I actually hate every single one of the Mr. Language Persons out there (except for the master himself, Dave Barry). I hate them even when they're right. Slimy rightwingers like Safire, George Will, and Bill Buckley seem to gravitate that way, but that's not my only reason.

And it's not just the chemical imbalance in my brain either, smartypants.

No, I do not consider hat to be a Mr Language Person yet, but I'm monitoring him.

You're right on the money, zizka. Menand's piece was way longer than it needed to be. He conflated a review with an article on voice, and one thing had almost nothing to do with the other.

If grammarians were all as entertaining as Lynne Truss, then evryone would be a grammarian. Isn't the crucial point here that 'Eats, Shoots and Leaves' is aimed at those who have never thought about grammar before?

My own question on Lynne Truss's American tour is - did she and her publishers release a 'proper' American edition - i.e. one edited for AMERICAN ENGLISH? I'm not sure if I'm hoping the answer is yes, or no: on the one hand, it's a bit of a rip-off if it's advocating British English. On the other hand, as a Brit, it makes me chuckle to think that soon we will be inundated with yankee tourists using British English grammar - or, as we like to think of it here, "proper English." Tee hee!!!

I bought and read the book last year. It's best not taken too seriously, except perhaps to be analysed as a publishing/cultural phenomenon. I don't think that in fact the book is aimed at those who've never thought about grammar before. I read this review recently. I don't necessarily agree that punctuation is quite that simple. But this, I think, is spot on:

'Truss wants you to read her book not to learn the rules of punctuation but to join her in bewailing, as you review these rules, the sorry ignorance of those who don't know them. It's to feel superior, and smug, and, well, almost … English.'

This is an American reviewer, of course, who wonders how it works if you are in fact English. The answer is that it works in pretty much the same way: you can consider yourself a better class of person, not one of those common sorts (hairdressers! greengrocers!) who don't know where to put their apostrophes.

And grammarians and, um, Language Persons can, of course, achieve a similar superiority effect in relation to Truss herself. Which is probably why they need to write overly long review articles to make sure that we know just how superior they are...

So, there you go: read it if you want to feel a nice warm smug glow; don't bother to read it if you seriously want to improve your grammar.

The best possible outcome of all this would be for the author and the publishers to take into account the errors, correct them, and republish with a brief apology. Eats, Shoots, and Leaves excited many with its promise, perhaps, because the time has come to defend the standards of the language and enforce them. I wonder if anyone has thought to send the publishers a copy of this thread?

zizka, Jonathan: You're right, of course, that after dispatching Truss he wanders off into a totally unrelated discussion of voice, but since I enjoyed it (and am given to unrelated excursuses myself, or excursus with a long second u if you will) and since everyone else who discusses the review has taken him to task for it, I didn't feel the need to mention it.

Annie: Heh!

I would say that his "meandering" anticipates the "attack" by Mullan and Frederick in the Guardian:

http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/referenceandlanguages/story/0,6000,1252098,00.html

Keith

I read both the book and the review, and my first nit to pick is that she's right about the "printers' marks" since the term refers to marks used by all printers. A lot of the rest of his complaints relate to the different usage for some punctuation in the UK as opposed to the usage in the US. I liked the book and felt I had found a kindred spirit--someone with her tongue planted firmly in her cheek! And yes, Dave Barry is one of my heroes. (Beginning a sentence with a conjunction is not incorrect usage, by the way, as a thorough perusal of most Supreme Court opinions will confirm. Of course, those old guys in black nightgowns aren't setting themselves up as language authorities, only the Court of Last Resort... well, don't get me started.)