Dopers, let me make a confession: I use semicolons.
When I met my first semicolon, back in high school, I think I fell in love. I saw how it could link independent clauses, and my heart thrilled. Since then, I’ve come to use the semicolon regularly; it’s as natural a part of my written style as its superstar cousins, the comma and period.
I have discovered, however, that my love of semicolons is not universal. Perhaps the semicolon is subject to abuse, though it seems likely that the people most likely to abuse punctuation marks would hardly know that the semicolon exists. For whatever reason, my semicolons seem to draw criticism from well-intentioned editors.
To the best of my knowledge and understanding, I use semicolons properly. (The Texas Law Review Manual on Usage and Style says to use the semicolon “to separate related independent clauses,” and that it “often indicates that the second clause clarifies the first.”) I admit that I might love my semicolons a bit too much, and use them too frequently as a result. I refuse to give up my semicolons just because some well-meaning philistine takes offense at them, but I don’t want to have to check myself into Semicolons Anonymous, either. What’s the best way to strike a happy medium, grammar Dopers?
(Finally, to prove that I’m not alone in my love of the semicolon: Celebrating the Semicolon… The article includes an especially amusing correction at the end.)
I am afflicted with the same curse. I post mainly to offer my condolences, rather than a definitive answer. Like you, I have a great deal of affection for the semicolon, the comma-splice of the literate.
I’m not sure there’s a factual answer to your question, but the rule that guides me is that if a construction tempts me to use a comma-splice to join independent clauses, a semicolon is appropriate.
They’re just so damned handy, and let’s face it: you feel a bit superior to others by employing their use. I just know that others are thinking “Wow, he uses those little dot-comma-thingies; I must bear his children.”
I refuse to give up my usage, even though previous bosses have tried to perform a semicolonoscopy on my writing style.
I think this belongs in Great Debates; there doesn’t appear to be a factual answer here.
I also love our dot-comma friend; it gives one an option of avoiding the finality of a period. To me, the most important litmus test is if you, as a reader, gets annoyed with them. If not, then you’re good to go. Who’s to say that commas and periods must rule our paragraphs?
The rule of semi-colons is upon us; resist at your own peril!
If your writing style calls for semicolons, by all means, use them! I’m an excess comma user myself, and specifically remember asking an English teacher in high school how to fix that. She read what I wrote, and said all my commas were in the right places; that’s just how I wrote. It’s a vicious cycle, though, because as you start to write like that, you’ll use more semicolons. As you use more semicolons, you’ll begin to find them more acceptable, and end up using even more;
I’m even worse - I love dashes too. (Actually I’m a triple abuser due to my overuse of parentheses.) In formal writing I check myself, but for something like message boards or email I like the (imagined?) subtlety these impart.
I used to love semicolons, but as I’ve gotten older I’ve come to see them as a sign of middle-class pretension–the Hyacinth Bucket of the punctuation world. They rarely add or subtract from a sentence, and one there is almost no risk in using one. They adorn sentences like an NPR bumper sticker on the back of a minivan, a shibboleth of the moderately well-educated.
I feel I can mention this to the OP. You see, LawMonkey, I know that you are above such things. I know this because I have discovered the true secret to punctuational sophistication: the well-placed colon. Count the punctuation in your favorite novel: you’ll find the colon (outside of lists and digital clocks) far rarer than its half-sibling. After all, you can’t toss a colon in simply anywhere. Using the colon requires a sense of flow, of relationship. It takes nerves and finesse to use a colon, especially between independent clauses. Your use in the OP was masterful. I nearly swooned.
The trouble with the semicolon is not usually folks’ ignorance of its proper usage. Rather, there is a wide range of “tightness” of coupling that people assign to the semicolon. In contrast, readers have a wide range of context expectations with the period, so you will almost always cause less reader distraction with one. Rarely does your point require the semicolon.
For example, I could have started this post with:
“The trouble with the semicolon is not usually folks’ ignorance of its proper usage; rather, there is a wide range of “tightness” of coupling that people assign to the semicolon.”
The second clause clearly extends the first, but the concept of a paragraph already has that contextual device covered. Most people reserve the semicolon for very tightly connected ideas, and when those people read the above sentence, they get jarred by the actual level of relation I’m after. A period would not have hidden the relationship between the sentences.
I find that a semicolon is needed every two to five pages. Any more than that, and you’re unecessarily distracting your readers. Use it when you must, not simply when you can.
(Not being disengenuous here, but) can you point out a couple of the commas you see as excessive? I went back and read carefully, and I would have punctuated his sentences exactly the same, except for “I admit that I might love my semicolons a bit too much, and use them too frequently as a result,” because the second clause isn’t an independent clause.
I only took two semester of English in college, and semicolon usage wasn’t really something discussed. To be honest it was just assumed we knew that sort of thing, my impression is that education in the last twenty years or so has moved away from grammar. We studied grammar all the way up until twelfth grade in “my day.” My nieces and nephews are all in High School and while I think of them as fairly bright (just from conversing with them) I found it amazing that they have never diagrammed a sentence, couldn’t define the word gerund, had only a vague understanding of direct/indirect objects.
They understood the concept of predicates and subjects, most basic punctuation, but little more. Colons and semicolons, no way.
They told me the vast majority of their English education has been in the form of analyzing literary works for at least the last few years, with little to no emphasis on English grammar or word usage. I think being able to meaningfully understand the written word is possibly (even probably) more important than understanding the finer points of English grammar. I’d rather someone be able to read a passage and take something away from it versus being able to properly diagram a sentence. But we were expected to be competent at both when I was in High School.
Anyway, back from that digression–a High School English teacher of mine once stated, “I could write a five page long sentence with several dozen semicolons and it would be technically correct within the rules of English grammar.” As an example of how extreme semicolon use could go. (Of course he advised against ever doing such a thing.)
I’ve started to remove a comma in sentences like the following: What I need now, though, is a good cup of tea. I’ve started just writing What I need now though, is a good cup of tea.
The first sentence sticks that “though” out there all alone, giving it great weight with a pause both before and after it. Unlike a dependent clause, I don’t think both are actually needed. “As for Sally and Jim, the protagonists in our story, they lived happily until they died.” That’s a dependent clause that needs separating with 2 commas. The “though,” not so much.
