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Subject:Prepositions ending sentences From:Karen Steele <karen -at- BILBO -dot- SUITE -dot- COM> Date:Thu, 28 Apr 1994 13:06:50 -0500
Len Olszewski writes:
> 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.
Boy, that is the truth!
In my case it probably stems from years spent at the mercy
of some really tough editors -- who have rendered me a
limp noodle in the face of such construction. (It's
always the fault of someone else!)
Over the years some (very old fashioned) rules of
rhetoric have become so ingrained that they are no longer
options (for some of us).
"Young whippersnappers, ending a sentence in a
preposition just because it makes for clarity... what
will they think of next? Punctuation outside of quotes"?
