I Do Love. Punctuation.

[Terry]

I'd agree with that Stephen,

I also wish I'd taken a bit more notice when I was at school.
I was fortunate enough to go to school when poetry was still an important part of the curriculum.

Terry

[Stephen Whiteside]

Who's Billy Collins?

[warooa]

filum critic

[Stephen Whiteside]

Race caller?

[Bob Pacey]

My stuff is always perfect Terry !

Perfect for me that is and that what counts

Bob

[Neville Briggs]

'Bush poetry writing' workshops are a dime a dozen

Go in the naughty corner Stephen, dimes are the stuff of those "damn Yankees".

. what i do love though is people makin stuff....particulary stuff of beauty - stuff that is done / made because they can't help but do it. it's people being brave, showing and sharing their view of this world....

Exactly Matt, perfectly put like a 150m drive straight down the fairway.

[David Campbell]

It’s probably not helpful to view punctuation as a mass of obscure rules that have to be mastered. It smacks too much of the classroom and rote learning. Zondrae’s example from the NFF shows that punctuation is simply a writer’s set of instructions to the reader: “This is how I want my poem read. I want a short pause here, a longer one there, this is a question, and that’s an exclamation!”

So listen to yourself reading the poem and issue your instructions accordingly. That may sound blindingly obvious, but I have a sneaking suspicion that quite a few poets view it differently. They write down the lines and then the thinking goes something like this: “Okay, now there’s got to be some punctuation in there somewhere….commas, for example. So I’ll put one at the end of each line and then maybe a couple of others…like before an ‘and’.” So they sprinkle away, as if there’s some sort of quota that has to be observed. You might think I’m exaggerating, but you should see some of the poems entered in competitions!

If you’re not confident, stick to the comma and full stop and don’t worry about the semi-colon (;), colon (:), or ellipsis (…).

In response to Zondrae’s question about capital letters at the start of each line, my dislike of the practice is well-known and clearly set out under the ‘Tips’ section of this website. It’s still reasonably common however, but, to me (and leaving aside place names etc.), a capital letter signifies the start of a new sentence after a full stop. It’s part of my instructions to the reader. From a utilitarian point of view, what instruction is being given by placing a capital at the beginning of each line? I can’t see any point, other than to indicate a new line, but that’s self-evident.

The two other punctuation bugbears are inverted commas and the use of the possessive apostrophe, and this is where you do have to learn a technique.

Firstly, if you’re using direct speech, the relevant punctuation goes inside the inverted commas. (Note: single inverted commas are often used these days, as in this example.)

‘I don’t know for sure,’ he said, ‘but I reckon you’re wrong!’

Secondly, the placing of the possessive apostrophe is determined by the question: “What (or who) is doing the possessing?” Consider this rather complex example: boys toys handles

It all comes back to communication. To begin with, ‘handles’ is a simple plural…the handles aren’t possessing anything, so there’s no apostrophe. (This is the old greengrocer label problem, where we see silly signs for APPLE’S and BANANA’S.)

Then it’s a question of how many boys and how many toys we’re dealing with, and, although this may seem pernickety, it could be important to the story you’re telling:

one boy and one toy: boy’s toy’s handles (i.e. the handles of the toy and the toy of the boy);
more than one boy and one toy: boys’ toy’s handles (i.e. the handles of the toy and the toy of the boys);
one boy and more than one toy: boy’s toys’ handles (i.e. the handles of the toys and the toys of the boy);
more than one boy and more than one toy: boys’ toys’ handles (i.e. the handles of the toys and the toys of the boys).

The other trap to watch out for is a collective noun like ‘children’. If you want to talk about the toy (or toys) that a group of children have it’s always children’s toy (or toys). It can’t be childrens’ toy (or toys) because that means the toy (or toys) of the childrens…and that doesn’t make sense because the word ‘children’ is already plural. So I go back to the basic question: “What (or who) is doing the possessing?” That’s the starting point.

If you’re purely writing for yourself, nobody gives a hoot how you do it. But if you’re going to put it out into the public arena, particularly for a written competition, then you need to communicate as clearly and precisely as possible. Everybody else is doing a ‘cold’ reading of what you’ve written…especially judges.

Cheers
David

[Neville Briggs]

So listen to yourself reading the poem

I reckon that's the heart of the matter.

[warooa]

Thanks David,

duly copied and pasted into my 'punchooayshun' tutorial for further reference.

Cheers, Marty

[Heather]

Billy Collins is an American poet, Stephen - google and all will be revealed.