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Transcript

00:04

Run-on sentences, a la Shmoop. Run-on sentences are bad grammar everyone

00:09

knows this except apparently for a few authors who think it's okay to throw proper punctuation

00:14

out the door in the name of their craft leaving the reader to suffer as he or she struggles

00:18

to figure out where one thought ends and the next begins.

00:21

Whew. Now that we've survived an encounter with a run-on sentence, let's talk about

00:26

what this particular piece of bad grammar actually...is.

00:29

While some people think that run-on sentences are just long...

00:32

...like, really, really, really long...

00:34

...a run-on sentence actually occurs when sentences are smashed together without the benefit of

00:38

any internal punctuation.

00:41

Run-on sentences may induce confusion...

00:43

...hysteria...

00:44

...and even the urge to throw books...

00:46

...so use extreme caution when constructing sentences.

00:49

The nice thing about run-on sentences is that they are easily fixed, and we have a whole

00:52

slew of tools to choose from...

00:54

...including colons, coordinating conjunctions, dashes, periods, and semicolons.

01:00

So, let's look at some examples of run-on sentences and how to fix 'em.

01:06

Say we have the run-on sentence, "William Faulkner is a well-known American author he

01:11

lived in Mississippi for most of his life you can visit his house in Oxford and see

01:16

where he scribbled all over the bathroom wall."

01:20

How can we fix this crime against grammar? Not to mention against poor Mr. Faulkner?

01:24

Well, we could deploy several periods, so we end up with...

01:27

..."William Faulkner is a well-known American author...period...He lived in Mississippi for

01:32

most of his life...period...You can visit his house in Oxford and see where he scribbled

01:37

all over the bathroom wall."

01:39

Or, we could deploy some periods and a well-placed "who" to get...

01:44

..."William Faulkner is a well-known American author who lived in Mississippi for most of

01:49

his life...period...You can visit his house in Oxford and see where he scribbled all over

01:54

the bathroom wall." Let's look at a different example. "Jim

01:58

is a fan of Cormac McCarthy's novels however he had a big problem when he tried to read

02:03

The Crossing half of that book is written in Spanish."

02:06

Well, let's fix this grammar disaster.

02:09

We could do this: "Jim is a big fan of Cormac McCarthy's novels...period...However...comma...

02:15

he had a big problem when he tried to read The Crossing...colon...half of that book is

02:20

written in Spanish."

02:22

Or, we could do this: "Jim is a fan of Cormac McCarthy's novels...comma...although he had

02:27

a big problem when he tried to read The Crossing...dash...half of that book is written in Spanish."

02:33

Or, we could try door number 3: "Jim is a fan of Cormac McCarthy's novels...period...

02:40

However...comma...he had a problem when he tried to read The Crossing because half of

02:45

that book is written in Spanish." Run-on sentences can be difficult for the

02:49

reader to comprehend.

02:50

So, while most of us will never have a really good reason to deploy a run-on sentence...

02:54

...this doesn't mean we won't encounter run-on sentences in literature.

02:58

For example, take this lengthy entry from James Joyce's novel, Ulysses...

03:03

"I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian

03:08

girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I

03:15

thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes..."

03:21

Let's stop right there. That's fifty-eight words without the benefit of any internal

03:27

punctuation, and while that may seem like a lot...

03:29

...the truth is that Joyce's sentence actually continues for another fifty-three words. Holy

03:35

moly. That gives us a total of one hundred and eleven words, no pauses, no stop until

03:41

the very end. While we could never get away with writing

03:44

like this...

03:44

...because our English teachers would lynch us...

03:47

...great authors with lots of critical acclaim and assorted Nobel and Pulitzer Prizes might

03:52

decide that a particular story calls for run-on sentences.

03:54

So, unless the literary critics start calling us "the next Ernest Hemingway", we need

03:59

to stick to proper internal punctuation...

04:01

...and avoid run-on sentences.

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