Prepositions

[Jay Cherniak <CHERNJC1_at_TEAPOST -at- TEOMAIL -dot- JHUAPL -dot- EDU>]

    I am glad someone finally quoted Churchill on ending sentences with
prepositions.

    Once I was working as a freelance writer for a well-known medical publisher
in Los Altos, California. The editor-in-chief had been with that publisher for
about 30 years. He had a Ph.D. in philology (yes philology, not philosophy)
from Stanford University. I was rewriting a chapter by using cut-and-paste and
noticed that a sentence in the old chapter, which had been published
previously, ended with a preposition. I asked the editor-in-chief whether it
was all right to end a sentence with a preposition. His response was: "Yes."
Since then I have not tried to rewrite prepositions out of the ends of
sentences unless, of course, there is a good reason to.

    The rule about not ending sentences with prepositions strikes me as an
urban legend, about which there has been some discussion on this list in weeks
past.



                                         Jay Cherniak
                                        Johns Hopkins University
                                        Applied Physics Laboratory




Well put, except that it was Churchill complaining about the
utter nonsense one of his aides had come up with in a
desparate attempt NOT to end a sentence with a preposition.
That is, Winny (God rest his soul) would never have insisted
that one should never end a sentence with a preposition.

See y'alls on Monday!

----- Begin Included Message -----

The most telling blow was struck by Wir [sic] Winston Churchill,
who, when accused of ending a sentence with a preposition, is
said to have replied: 'This is the type of arrant pedantry up with
which I shall not put.'

----- End Included Message -----

Tim Pera
Technical Writer - Publishing Business Systems, Inc.
2833 Fairview Ave. N., Suite B - Roseville, MN USA 55113
tel 612.639.2713 - fax 612.639.0662
e-mail tim -at- pbs -dot- com, tjpera -at- maroon -dot- tc -dot- umn -dot- edu