This short piece was written first as a comment on a typically thought-provoking article in the Guardian by David Mitchell: “A chilling catastrophe punctuated my week”, one of the few articles published under the Guardian’s banner “Comment is Free” where comments were briefly possible. It has been lengthened slightly, the original having been written in haste, for fear that the Guardian would realise its mistake in allowing free speech on its pages and close the comments down.
My Dad, though just a pen-pushing civil servant all his life, was a committed DIY man. He installed our first central heating system while recovering from a double hernia operation in 1965. When challenged, he would say “When you look at the people who do it for a living, if you can’t do better than that … “ trailing off, just like that.
For many years, I found pride in my Dad for this and tried to emulate his can-do spirit (with some success). It is only later in life that I find myself feeling uncomfortable at the pejorative implications of what he said. He was not recognising the skills of the many professionals out there. He was disparaging them. Nor was he recognising his own latent practical strengths. He was diminishing their significance - “I’d have to be really stupid not to be able to do this well.”
Still, I have to admit it has served me well, over all. And served to make me useful. How many people across my life have rewarded a simple tweaking of a screw with “Wherever did you learn to do that? I wouldn’t know where to start.” Which really is the problem. Giving up before you start is convenient, but it leaves your world rapidly descending into chaos.
Like giving up on punctuation. I tried to explain to some self-aggrandising proponent of anti-grammar last week that language has one purpose: the unambiguous communication of your meaning (unless you are a diplomat, or a politician or David Frost). Grammar - punctuation - gives you the tools to make your meaning clear when you write it down.
Punctuation when writing serves the same purpose as vocal inflection. It shows the reader how the words are meant to be associated. Without it, the reader is left to derive what meaning she or he can from a porridge of words. There will be many occasions on which this mish-mash is not merely acceptable but intentional on the part of the author. But where precision is needed – where, for example, culpability has to be proved beyond reasonable doubt, or the ownership of a bequest under a will is concerned, or liability to supply goods or carry out services needs to be established – precision of meaning is vital, correct use of punctuation is the tool we need to remove ambiguity. It is the nuts and bolts that ensure that the bridge between the author’s intention and the reader’s understanding does not collapse.
Correct use of punctuation (on both sides of the equation) requires skill and discipline. Small wonder that poorly educated and lazy people deprecate it. But there is no excuse for the tolerably well-schooled, who make their living from words seeking popularity and wealth by appeasing, and shoring up, the ignorant. To accuse those who continue to care about meaning of “pedantry” because they try to hold to the purpose of language is to misuse the word. There is nothing “excessive” about necessary precision. It is the pursuit, and protection, of freedom.
I learned that while performing in the career my mother chose for me: legislative drafting.
