Break out the champagne! A new edition of Garner’s Modern American Usage is available!
(I know, only editors could get excited about this. But I am excited.)
Garner’s is the de facto standard usage guide for American English, offering guidance on burning issues such as when to use farther versus further or when to use which versus that. Garner writes in a highly readable style, and his approach simple and sensible:
Generally, writing is good if readers find it easy to follow; writing is bad if readers find it hard to follow.
He is also highly practical, writing that:
… recommendations on usage must be genuinely plausible. They must recognize the language as it currently stands, encourage reasonable approaches to editorial problems, and avoid refighting battles that were lost long ago.
The need to “recognize the language as it currently stands” and adjust one’s usage decisions accordingly is all the reasoning I need to purchase this third edition of the book.
What are you waiting for?
This entry was posted on Thursday, July 9th, 2009 at 11:54 am and is filed under Resources for editors, Usage. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.



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