| 词组 | comma fault |
| 释义 | comma fault Comma fault is one of the names (others are comma splice, comma blunder, comma error) that composition teachers give to the joining of two independent clauses by a comma alone. It is one species of run-on sentence and has been denounced as an error at least since MacCracken & Sandison 1917. The modern comma fault seems to be a survivor from an older, looser form of punctuation: • As to the old one, I knew not what to do with him, he was so fierce I durst not go into the pit to him — Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, 1719 • Why, sure Betty, thou art bewitcht, this cream is burnt too —Jonathan Swift, Polite Conversation, 1738 • The New Jersey job was obtained, I contrived a copperplate press for it —Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography, 1771 These examples were not considered faulty when they were written, as 18th century punctuation did not follow the conventions that we practice today. But even as the standards of punctuation were evolving during the 19th century to those we are familiar with, the older, looser punctuation continued to be employed in personal letters: • I have found your white mittens, they were folded up within my clean nightcap —Jane Austen, letter, 24 Aug. 1805 • It is not necessary for Miss M. to be an authoress, indeed I do not think publishing at all creditable either to men or women —Lord Byron, letter, 1 May 1812 • Well, I won't talk about myself, it is not a healthy topic —Lewis Carroll, letter, 29(?) July 1885 The epistolary comma fault has continued into the 20th century: • This is a big picture as it has a million dollar budget and I think it is going to be a good one, it will be some time before it is finished —Ronald Reagan, letter, 2 Aug. 1938 • Tell Johnny to read Santayana for a little while, it will improve his sentence structure —E. B. White, letter, 11 Mar. 1963 It seems most probable that the origin of the comma splice is the use of the comma to represent a relatively brief pause in speech (18th-century prose is closer to actual speech than it often appears now, and letters are often a close approximation of speech). Further evidence for this hypothesis can be found in modern transcriptions of speech. In the next example, the speech is fictitious: • The Ambassador ... responded with a blast of enthusiasm. "Those weren't tough questions, those were kid-glove questions " —John Updike, Bech Is Back, 1982 The two independent clauses beginning with those would have been spoken so rapidly that any punctuation other than a comma would hardly have been possible. The comma similarly used turns up in transcriptions of actual speech: • ... and I think that the first books, God's Little Acre and the short stories, that's enough for any man, he should be content with that, but knowing writers, I know he's not —William Faulkner, 13 May 1957, in Faulkner in the University, 1959 • The Encyclopaedia Britannica lives off installment buying, this is our whole business —William Benton, quoted in Studs Terkel, Hard Times, 1970 • And I thought, 'Oh my God, my bosoms are being seen for God's sake, I can't stand it!' —Jacqueline Bisset, quoted in Cosmopolitan (London), October 1974 Composition teachers, however, are rather more concerned with inadvertent comma faults that creep into student papers in ordinary expository prose. It is probably a tribute to these teachers that uncorrected examples are so hard to find in print. The example we show you below comes from a specialized journal more concerned with the dissemination of information than with literary values. It also, the sharp-eyed will note, contains a misspelling. • An unusual and beautiful coiffeur is not all that embellishes Daisy, she also has very long thick eye lashes and thin, flat, elongated nostrils —Chronicle ofthe Horse, 16 Mar. 1984 The comma fault in discursive prose is sometimes purposely used by writers for stylistic effect. As a device it can be found in the fiction of William Faulkner, Edna Ferber, E. L. Doctorow, and many others. You probably should not try the device unless you are very sure of what you want it to accomplish. Here are three examples: • Orvie was being very helpful, he organized dances and games, he had passed plates of chicken and ice cream, he danced with some of the more awful wives —Edna Ferber, Come and Get It, 1935 • If I came in early I distracted them, if I came in late I enraged them, it was my life they resented, the juicy fullness of being they couldn't abide —E. L. Doctorow, Loon Lake, 1979 • Her face is intelligent. The hair is somewhere between strawberry and gold, you can't tell in this light —Jay Mclnerney, Bright Lights, Big City, 1984 |
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