The Truth About English Grammar

“For two or three centuries writers... have analyzed grammar badly and explained it in antiquated, clunky, or totally mistaken ways,” according to this stimulating if dense treatise. Linguist Pullum (Linguistics) complicates traditional understandings of the English language, contending that because nouns include such “abstract notions” as “absence” and “failure,” it’s inaccurate to define them as simply naming persons, places, or things. Many grammatical “rules” actually just reflect the arbitrary opinions of centuries-old writers, Pullum argues, noting that it was considered acceptable to end a sentence with a preposition until the poet John Dryden, for reasons he never explained, denigrated the practice in a 1672 essay. Pullum takes palpable delight in taking grammar snobs down a notch, but the alternatives he offers to their flawed ideas are unfortunately too esoteric to be of much use to the average person, as when he suggests that instead of defining a “subject” as “the doer of the action,” it should be understood as “an often obligatory NP [noun phrase] of which the most interesting fact is that it often requires a verb to change its form.” Additionally, discussions of “lexemes” and “modal auxiliaries” can get a bit technical. Though abstruse in places, this will give grammarians much to ponder. (Sept.)