I was first introduced to this book in my creative writing class. Well, I stole a quick glance at my professor's stack of books and the peculiar title caught my eye. I was not certain what the title was alluding to until I read "the panda joke and it's variations":http://think.patchesandmarble.com/archives/main/observation/2004/07/000029.html on the Web. I was a little behind in my knowledge of jokes; who has time for everything?
The next natural step for a bibiliophile was to look it up on "Amazon.com":http://www.amazon.com/. It is a book about punctuation, and despite the vow-of-no-purchase that I always make everytime I visit bookstores, I caved into temptation and bought myself a copy.
So why punctuation and grammar, why now? Consider a typical example of a conversation that I might have with a friend, on iChat or AIM:
*friend:* hey, how r u?
*me:* I am well, thank you for asking. How are you?
*friend:* i'm ok...... r we on this tue?
*me:* I suppose so.
*friend:* i sent you txt msg, but u didnt reply.....
*me:* I probably turned my phone off.
*friend:* lets try this new place.......i heard its good......u'r fine w/it?
*me:* I suppose so.
Who am I writing to? A Martian using the Morse code? This could very well be the result of punctuation indolence that borders on grammatical heresy. I would fit the description of a stickler for punctuation and grammar. Yes indeed. A sentence such as "there is less than two hundred people in the room" would trigger within me an urge to correct the speaker. I am not a grammarian, not at all. I confess that I have my share of mistakes in the past, but flagrant errors like these are too painful to bear. Therefore, it is quite natural for me to be interested in any book that discusses repeated offenses in languages.
Punctuation is "a courtesy designed to help readers to understand a story without stumbling." It is good manners, the decorum to help us pause, ponder and understand before we stop. The funny marks--dots with a tails, dashes, paired dots--convey different meanings without much explanation. Consider this example:
*Unpunctuated series of words:*
a woman without her man is nothing
*Some may say:*
A woman, without her man, is nothing.
*However, I think this is much better:*
A woman: without her, man is nothing.
Funny how little things alter everything.
Eats, Shoots & Leaves is not a book of rules and regulations of the English language. It is not a puritanical homily on the virtues of good grammar. It is an adorable, amusing, and deliciously witty approach to an otherwise dreary subject. With history, anecdotes and examples, Lynne Truss shows us how we have effaced the roles of punctuation over time and argues that we should root for the unsung heroes--the commas, the semicolons, the apostrophes. She provides us with guidelines of usage to save the punctuation's habitat in sentences and paragraphs, to restore the original meaning of a panda's description, and to acknowledge that the mammal "eats shoots and leaves."
"Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation":http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1592400876/
by Lynne Truss
Published April 2004
ISBN: 1592400876