Writer, punctuation and style

All artistic structures are said to possess three formative and aesthetic qualities: order, connection, and rhythm. Jonathan Swift, the author of Gulliver’s Travels, once defined good style in writing as ‘proper words in proper places’. One could well expand his definition a little and say that good writing involves ‘proper words in proper places, and properly punctuated’.

The students of essay writing are too occupied with learning vocabulary and grammar to spare a thought to punctuation which, grammarians and literary greats argue, is the ineluctable part of grammar. Punctuation orchestrates the symphony based on the interplay between silence and sound.

The prime function of punctuation is to crystallise structural uncertainties in a text, and point out the nuances of semantic significance which might not be consummated at all, or would be at best challenging for the reader to figure out. Punctuation also invites readers to import to the process of interpretation the elements of their own wider behavioural experience.

The role of punctuation must never be confined merely to its mechanics. It is an art form per se. As a case study, the enigmatic ellipsis, a trio of dots that beckons the imagination to wander beyond the confines of the page. Waltzing across the white expanse in its ethereal dance, it narrates untold stories and unfinished thoughts, leaving a trail in its wake. The meek comma is a delicate pause in the fleet flow of words, allowing gasping thoughts to breathe and ideas to resonate.

Punctuation, however, is not restricted merely to subtlety and suggestion; it is also deployed to emphasise and assert where words stand incapacitated. For a swatch, the mighty exclamation mark commands attention and conveys passion with its resounding cry. Caution! It must be used only in informal text as there is no room for such a trumpet blast of emotions in formal composition.

Nevertheless, equal opposition of punctuation has been voiced by literary heavy weights. GB Shaw despised orthographic marks and branded apostrophes as ‘uncouth bacilli’. The text of his play, Pygmalion, shows the frequent use of ‘didnt’, ‘aint’ and ‘wont’ but he did use he’ll, and it’s to avoid confusion with hell and its. Shaw abhorred dashes too: he called them “the refuge of those who are too lazy to punctuate”. F Scott Fitzgerald says: “An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke.”

Jessica Bennet, writing in The New York Times, notes that today, “it’s as if our punctuation is on steroids ... tiny marks in the smallest of spaces that suddenly tell us more about the person on the other end than the words themselves ....”

Author Leah Peterson conjectures a psychological linkage between a writer’s use of a punctuation mark and the spectrum of his mental activity. She asserts that every writer uses and abuses at least one punctuation mark, which proves self-revelatory for him.

Those who overuse the period are decisive and clear while those who relish the comma are peacemakers who like to get along. Those who are frank with the exclamation point are prone to be anxious, excitable and opinionated, while those with the question mark, indecisive and self-analysing, having low self-esteem.

Similarly, writer Alexandra Petri reads between the lines of those who are addicted to Oxford comma, the most controversial punctuation mark in English orthography: “You are a person who insists on telling other people how good your grammar is and how much you care about it.”

The language expert Robert Allen explains through an analogy that punctuation is to writing what stitching is to clothing: just as stitches hold a garment together and help give it a shape, punctuation helps hold our words together and gives form to our writing.

Style is more than just structure. It “takes its shape more from attitudes of mind than from principles of composition”, and punctuation doesn’t let any writer remain incognito. This is inevitable as well as enjoyable.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 25^th, 2024.

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