Headline writers in the US have a zealous love affair with the humble comma, and none more so than those at the NY Times. N’er a page on the Grey Lady’s sheets goes without shoving a comma into a headline. I presume the reasoning is for dramatic effect – similar to that of Days of our Lives, where dramatic pauses can sometimes fill an entire episode. Here’s a headline from todays NYT:
Out of the Wardrobe, Into a War Zone
Here in the unenchanted world of ordinary moviegoing, it has been about two and a half years since “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,” the first installment in Walt Disney and Walden Media’s mighty “Chronicles of Narnia” franchise. In wartime England, where…
Here in Britain, (the first country to rule the world) it’s different. When I was chief deputy sub-editor at The Economist in the eighties we cast those little ruddy tadpoles out in favour of (maximum) nine word sentences. At the Daily Mirror, where I was consultant editor for eleven years, we went one better and reduced all sentences to one word. Impossble. Not, at all. Certainly. Not
Tags: comma, cyclones, grammar, headlines, is there anymilk not gone off in the fridge, New York Times, news, views
May 16, 2008 at 7:03 pm
Just found your blog and loveee it. one thing: assume you were being ironical with the “day’s” of our lives” above. misplaced apostrophes are a sin far greater than overused commas imho, but then I subscribe to the e.e. cummings school of capitalization.
May 16, 2008 at 7:25 pm
My dear Washwords,
How could such a blemish have appeared in such a publication? That’s what I asked the sub editor before I booted him out of our London Eye capsule and into the unforgiving Thames. Thank you.