A Dash of Style (9 page)

• Taking a step back and looking at a paragraph in context, it's easier to see the flaws. Some sentences will be too long, some too short, and some long-short combinations will be jarring. The semicolon is the great balancer. There is no better tool to help smooth out a group of sentences and allow them to work within the context of the paragraph. Consider this example from F. Scott Fitzgerald's
Tender Is the Night:

Before eight a man came down to the beach in a blue bathrobe and with much preliminary application to his person of the chilly water, and much grunting and loud breathing, floundered a minute in the sea. When he had gone, beach and bay were quiet for an hour. Merchantmen crawled westward on the horizon; bus boys shouted in the hotel court; the dew dried upon the pines.

The punctuation in each of these sentences mirrors the content. The opening, long sentence, captures the feeling of the man spending a long time at the beach. The second, short sentence captures the peace and quiet after he leaves. And the final sentence prolongs that quiet, captures what it means in particular. Note also how, in context, the semicolon balances the paragraph. If the final sentence had been broken up with periods (making three short sentences), the paragraph would have been too choppy.

• Keep in mind that a semicolon takes the pause effect away from a nearby comma, and takes the stop effect away from a nearby period. When the semicolon connects, the comma becomes less important; when it divides, the period seems less meaningful. Commas and periods do have a power of their own. Their effect can be lost when too many (or ill-placed) semicolons come onto the scene. And there might be times when you want the impact to fall on the comma or period. Even though the semicolon can work in any given circumstance, it doesn't mean it should. Always be mindful of its stealing the limelight.

Alternately, sometimes you can use the semicolon to actually enhance the power of a comma or period. By creating a long sentence with a semicolon, for example, you give yourself the opportunity to contrast it with a shorter sentence. Consider this example from Harold Brodkey's
Profane Friendship:

Here is the self and the hovering moment; here is the trembling, nervous, seemingly near motionlessness of the surface of the water; here is the rustling bowwave and wake; here they are in subduedly echoing canals in Murano; then here is the Lagoon again, Venice ahead obscured; here is
San Michele
on the left pretending that the dead are silent and are not numberless; here is the gouging and choppy passage of the white motorboat over gray fluidities, the lighted grayish rain-teased air holding a glow as of a decomposing moon, and I am enveloped in flitters of memory which I resist of the canals in Venice itself, the wrinkled water in the no behind our house, the secret hushes and whispers there, time's indescribable motion on a Venetian afternoon. I was a child here. And here is my history of love.

He offers his observations of Italy as he flies over it, and the semicolons here allow us to absorb an (extremely) full image at once. They offer a nice parallel to the content itself, since flying over a country would, indeed, offer several images at once, yet with a bit of separation. But notice especially how Brodkey concludes this

excerpt, the radical brevity of the final two sentences. It is a supreme example of context, of radically contrasting sentence length in order to make a point stand out.

WHAT YOUR USE OF THE SEMICOLON REVEALS ABOUT YOU

As the semicolon is an advanced tool, the writer who overuses it is likely to be somewhat advanced, one who takes chances with language and strives to make it the best it can be. This bodes well. However, since the semicolon is also a fairly formal, classy tool, the writer who overuses it is also likely to lean toward pretentiousness. He is more likely to write in flowery, ornate prose, and the writing is likely to be overly intricate. Simplification is needed. This writer is likely to be more prose than plot oriented, and will suffer from a slower pace and less action. His writing will more likely lack a dramatic punch.

It is hard to underuse the semicolon, since a work can exist perfectly well without one. That said, there are cases when it is called for, and the writer who completely ignores it is likely to either be a beginner, or hesitant to take chances with language. He is less likely to have well-crafted prose, less likely to offer nuances of style and language. The good news, at least, is that he writes with simplicity, which bodes well for clarity of thought and will serve him well once he masters his craft. He is also likely to offer a quicker pace.

EXERCISES

• Count the number of semicolons on the first page of one of your works. Now count the total number in your first chapter. What's the semicolon count per page? Per chapter? Do you barely use them? Or use them abundantly? Awareness is the first step.

• Look for a place in your work that contains a cluster of short sentences that are related to each other. Can you connect any of these with a semicolon? What effect does it have? Can you apply this technique elsewhere in your work?

• Look for a place in your work that contains several longer sentences that need to be long since they contain one or more complex thoughts. Can you break up any of these sentences with a semicolon? What effect does it have? Can you apply this technique elsewhere in your work?

• Look for a place in your work where you use an abundance of semicolons. Can you cut some of them? What effect does it have? Can you apply this technique elsewhere in your work? (Notice how deleting semicolons gives power back to commas and periods.)

• Look for a place in your work that reads too fast, where you'd like to slow the pace. Can you combine any sentences using semicolons? What effect does it have on pacing? Can you apply this technique elsewhere in your work?

• Look for a place in your work that you feel reads too slowly, where you'd like to speed up the pace. Can you delete any semicolons? What effect does it have on pacing? Can you apply this technique elsewhere in your work?

• Look for a paragraph in your work that contains sentences of wildly varying length. Can you use a semicolon to balance out sentence length? What effect does it have? Can you apply this technique elsewhere in your work?

While the punctuation marks discussed in part 1 (the period, comma, and semicolon) are the construction team of the punctuation world, the types of punctuation we'll cover in part 2 (the colon, dash, parentheses, quotation marks, paragraph and section breaks) exist to add flair. This is not to say that these marks don't also effect sentence construction—they can and certainly do. But, their most distinctive feature is their ability to make words stand out.

They have the unique ability to propel words or clauses into the limelight, and their appearance always carry with them a good deal of panache. They are the drama queens of the punctuation world.

Additionally, with the exception of the paragraph break, these marks rarely appear because they need to—they appear only if they
want
to. In fact, technically one could write a book without ever using one of these marks. The word "utilitarian" does not exist in their vocabulary. Fittingly, this part of the book will take the reader beyond the utilitarian and into the world of rarefied writing. Our house has been built. Now it's time to add the detail.

THE COLON
is the magician
of
the punctuation
world.
It holds its audience in suspense, waits until just the right moment, then voila: it pulls back the curtain to reveal the result. It sits on the very peak of drama, with all that comes before building to it, and all that follows a denouement. As such, it is one of the most effective punctuation marks to propel a word or clause into the limelight. (This is why the colon comes first in this section of the book.) Indeed, it is impossible to follow a colon in an inconspicuous way.

Like the semicolon, the colon tends to be underused by creative writers, and when used, not used well. Most writers seem intimidated to use it creatively, perhaps because they equate it with its mundane usages (such as heralding a list, or a letter, or separating minutes from seconds on a clock). Other writers use it once or twice but find themselves overwhelmed by its dramatic power and are unsure where to go from there. The avoidance of the colon is unfortunate, since it is one of the most powerful tools in the arsenal of a creative writer.

HOW TO
USE
IT

• In its most majestic, overt form the colon reveals. Indeed, when it comes to dramatic revelation, the colon has no second. In this function, the colon acts as a mark point, with the text preceding it building to a revelation, and the text that follows living up to the promise. The highly visual colon helps us immediately distinguish two parts of the sentence, to know that we are crossing a threshold. Consider:

I grabbed my bag, put on my coat, and stepped out the door, as I wasn't coming back.

In this example, we don't feel a revelation, don't feel the impact of "I wasn't coming back." Adding a colon, though, changes everything:

I grabbed my bag, put on my coat, and stepped out the door: I wasn't coming back.

Now we know this is a peak moment; now the sentence is divided neatly into parts, and there is a clear purpose for each. The colon has shown us that the focus of this sentence is not the bag, the coat, or the stepping out, but the fact that he wasn't coming back. It has propelled this clause into the limelight.

Keep in mind that in order to achieve this, you must first craft a sentence where the opening clause builds to a revelation and the second portion delivers. A revelation is ineffective without preparation, and preparation is pointless without revelation.

• The colon can be used, simply, to offset a point. Sometimes a point, like a youngest child, needs to stand out, to be given extra attention, perhaps for clarity's sake, or for fear of its getting lost in

the midst of a complex sentence. You must always consider whether the sleepy, 2:00 a.m. reader might accidentally gloss over a word or clause. If this is your intention (as it is for some writers who strive to be subtle), then that is fine, but if not, you must think of the reader, and assume the worst-case scenario. Reading is a different experience for everyone, and if an idea is important enough that you can't afford to take the chance of its being missed, a colon will make sure it stands out. With a colon present, the first part of the sentence will be the equivalent of, "I have a point to make, are you ready?" and then the point will follow. Compare this: