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Ducks1160 Posted 17 years ago
Grammar

Commas

Should there be a comma after "chair" in the following sentence. If so, why?

She leapt from her chair, waving and calling to him.
  

Top answer

HI Ducks, and welcome to English Forums. I love your avatar! Yes, use the comma.

— BarbaraPA

  • HI Ducks, and welcome to English Forums.
  • I love your avatar!
  • Yes, use the comma.
  • What follows the comma modifies "she" so the separation from "her chair" makes that clear (just in cse you did think a chair could wave and call ).
  • If you reversed it, you'd have "Waving and calling to him, she leapt from her chair" you'd certainly include the comma.
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5 Answers
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HI Ducks, and welcome to English Forums. I love your avatar!

Yes, use the comma. What follows the comma modifies "she" so the separation from "her chair" makes that clear (just in cse you did think a chair could wave and call
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First, would like to thank you for teaching me a new word: avatar. I think you must be as elegant as your avatar. Then I want to thank you for answering my question so quickly and doing it in a way I will remember. I just found this site the other day, and love it.[L]
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Ducks1160 I think you must be as elegant as your avatar.

<<grin>> - I just took down my old one, an elephant. I'm probably about as elegant as THAT one
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Hi. When you have a participle clause (or is that a participle phrase?), either past or present, in a sentence after a comma, would you say it always modifies a subject? Or could it be that we could have cases where modification is for the whole sentence?

Ducks1160's sentence:

She leapt from her chair, waving and calling to him.



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Yes, it seems to me too, that here it modifies everything before the comma (which still, as GG says, makes it clear that the chair is not moving and talking).
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