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JJDouglas Posted 10 years ago
Grammar
Which construction would you say is best?
This is a question regarding the placement of commas. I'm not sure which of these options is preferable:
"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it and, once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."
"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it, and once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."
"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it, and, once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."
I'm also wondering if you could replace "once it's been broken" with just "once broken". Or would saying "once broken, the consequences will be devastating" cause a dangling modifier since the consequences aren't the thing being broken?
"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it and, once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."
"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it, and once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."
"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it, and, once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."
I'm also wondering if you could replace "once it's been broken" with just "once broken". Or would saying "once broken, the consequences will be devastating" cause a dangling modifier since the consequences aren't the thing being broken?
Top answer
JJDouglas "This old family heirloom is very fragile. " That's correct, though I tend to omit the comma before 'and' to avoid overkill.
- JJDouglas "This old family heirloom is very fragile.
- " That's correct, though I tend to omit the comma before 'and' to avoid overkill.
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2 Answers
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JJDouglas"This old family heirloom is very fragile. It doesn't take much to damage it, and, once it's been broken, the consequences will be devastating."That's correct, though I tend to omit the comma before 'and' to avoid overkill.
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Thank you for your reply. Would you say that the second example is incorrect, then? I ask because that was the solution I originally read about (I think it was in Fowler's Modern English style guide), but it seems to be going out of fashion.
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