Re: Prepositions ending sentences

[Len Olszewski <saslpo -at- UNX -dot- SAS -dot- COM>]

Barb Philbrick writes:

> I've got one of those niggling questions - how do other people feel about
> ending sentences with prepositions?

Whenever I see writing in which sentences end with prepositions, I sneer
and smugly think, "Amateur; *dilettante*!"

Not wanting to have others judge my work in an equally shallow fashion,
I generally tend to rewrite to avoid ending sentences with prepositions.
Usually, I can accomplish this with relative ease, but the word count
also goes up.

So, in cases where I need to be especially succinct, I tend to suspend
this rule, and use prepositions to end sentences with. 8^)

[...]

> My basic philosophy is to write so that users aren't distracted by unnatural
> structures, which I think the "at which" and other clauses to move the
> preposition tend to cause. However, this is my opinion, and I'd like to know
> how others feel about this.

Pretty good rule. I'll still sneer at your stuff (so what, right?), but
I doubt your writing will be any less clear, and I guarantee you'll save
words. This is one of the areas you may need to follow your style sheet
if you have one.  Your editors also usually have a big say in whether
you can get away with stuff like this.

[...]

|Len Olszewski, Project Manager  | "Hardcopy is the ultimate backup!" |
|saslpo -at- unx -dot- sas -dot- com|Cary, NC, USA|   -John Sanders                    |
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| Opinions this ludicrous are mine. Reasonable opinions will cost you.|