Printer-friendly version
Author:
Taxonomy upgrade extras:
I wrote a story this week which is in the "let it stew" stage. As I should, I used spell check and discovered some alleged mistakes in my writing. One of the sentences I wrote said, "So, I watched him and her together wishing I was her." Spell check said, "...wishing I was she." The disputed word is an object of the sentence fragment, not the subject ("I" is the subject of the fragment). therefore "her" is correct.
Moral: use "Spell Check" but also use your brain. "Spell Check" is only a computer program.
Comments
Or
You can learn to not need spell check and just not make the mistakes, an advantage of using notepad. Im over 30 so my teenage years of proper punctuation, grammer, and spelling is a tad rusty.
Counting on technology to fix your mistakes is being lazy. Just my opinion.
Actually
The most correct grammar would be ...wishing I were she.
She because this is not a verb that takes an object, it's to be which takes nominative case on both ends. And were because this sentence is in subjunctive mood. :)
I should say: was her is not wrong, it's just that were she is more correct. The rules are not has hard and fast in English as in some other languages.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Wrong
"...I were her" is correct. "I", being the one doing the action is therefore the subject. "Were", being the action is the verb. "Her" is the one the action is being done to therefore is the object. Rest my case. "Was" and "were" are two forms of the same verb: "to be." (or not to be, that is the question - Hamlet)
shalimar
Not to argue about it but
To be does not take objects in strict grammar. People do say, "It's me," but strict grammar says that "It is I" is more correct. That was the point I made. To be is not like other verbs. English is full of exceptions.
But it's not wrong either way. It's just more correct to use nominative case on both ends of to be.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
That looks like something
That looks like something that would be flagged by a grammar check rather than a spell check. I think that grammar checking technology is much less reliable and useful, so if the program I'm using gives me a choice, I'll turn spell check on, grammar check off.
Kris
{I leave a trail of Kudos as I browse the site. Be careful where you step!}
Kris
{I leave a trail of Kudos as I browse the site. Be careful where you step!}
Tradition!
When pronouns follow a linking verb (the various forms of "to be," but also "to seem" and similar words) one strictly uses the subject form, so if one were an English grammarian, one might use the subjunctive and say, "...wishing I were she." However, this form (including the subjunctive case itself) is very nearly extinct in modern English, and will very likely sound stilted or hypercorrect to the vast majority of colloquial English speakers. "...wishing I was her" isn't exactly correct, but neither is it entirely wrong. English speakers don't have an Academy with authority to decide what's right and what's wrong; we have what's essentially a very large committee of users who decide almost everything on an ad hoc basis, depending upon how we collectively feel when we wake up in the morning.
Woe is I,
Puddin'
A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style
-
Cheers,
Puddin'
A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style
Exactly
It's a sore spot with some grammarians that usage has changed, almost within my lifetime. And the subjunctive is seldom used "correctly" either. :)
The difference between which and that is another that can tie a strict grammarian's undies in a knot. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
And I'm one of those habitual stricties...
So as I've been reading this entire thread I've been cringing to myself.
This is something I really can't help... It's been thoroughly ingrained in the very core of my being that all words must either follow the rules, or be broken for very specific and special reasons.
I'll usually auto-correct bad grammar when I'm reading in "fun" mode, once I've gotten a feel for the authors... habits... But if I'm in editor mode, hoo boy, no one likes me.
I won't edit other peoples work for this very reason.
Abigail Drew.
Abigail Drew.
Two ways
That's all right, but it's also important that you differentiate between two use cases.
In your descriptive text feel free to ensure that your English is as close to your chosen standard as possible. Remember, though, that people don't talk like that. Within the quotation marks you have to apply different rules.
If you have characters which come from different social groups, regions or even different countries their speech is not going to sound the same, and they'll use different words and contractions. You have to allow what they say to point up the differences in their origins. If you don't, your story will come across as forced.
Not that your own stories come across as forced, of course. Just sayin'.
Penny
But of course!
One of these days I'll introduce a character who uses a very densely contracted dialect... It's fun t'talk like't, don't y'know?
The point is, I know the rules, so I'm empowered to make my bending and breaking of them even more powerful. Intentional rule breaking elicits a specific response. Unintentional rule breaking just makes me cringe.
Abigail Drew.
Abigail Drew.