The Glamour Of Grammar The Glamour Of Grammar: A Guide To The Magic And Mystery Of Practical English A Guide To The Magic And Mystery Of Practical English (2010)
About book The Glamour Of Grammar The Glamour Of Grammar: A Guide To The Magic And Mystery Of Practical English A Guide To The Magic And Mystery Of Practical English (2010)
I really wanted to like this book but I think it was written for a different audience. It may also be my fault since my expectations were different from what the book delivered. I was hoping for a Lynn Truss-like book about rules of grammar and language that are a little unusual or unheard of. I was hoping to be edified and perhaps amused by light-hearted humor. The author did attempt some humor but I think you might need to be a middle-aged man to really enjoy his jokes. And he doesn't even like Lynn Truss! He is a descriptivist (sounds perfect--so am I) but I much prefer the prescriptivism of Eats, Shoots, and Leaves to the descriptivism of an author bent on forcing others to appreciate his boring, humdrum rules of language with no added cleverness or originality. Clark spent fifty chapters discussing rules of language that I already knew--nothing new or little known or unique was discussed. I "learned" about verbs and nouns and active and passive voice and any number of boring, basic English structure. I thought that a person writing about grammar would be writing to an audience who cares about these things, meaning he'd write to those who already know the basics and are looking for more depth and expansion. Clark did not write to such an audience. He wrote to fifth graders learning how to write for the first time.I did enjoy the samples of writing he frequently used as examples of what he was discussing. I enjoyed hearing beautiful writing and guessing who wrote it in which book. It was extra fun when I recognized certain quotes from books I'd already read. I had even heard of the telegram jokes Clark inserted into the last chapter. But the book just wasn't fresh enough for me. Clark mentioned a lot about his life, allowing the book to be part-autobiography but his life is not terribly interesting to me, so I didn't appreciate the inserts. I especially disliked his political opinions, obvious but not outrightly written throughout each chapter. He loves the use of colorful language when used appropriately but I couldn't agree with any of his arguments on appropriate use so I especially disliked his use of so much swearing in certain chapters. Have you ever read a book where the author's voice was so smug and full of his own pleasure at being an author that you couldn't get into the story because the author kept getting in the way? That's how this book felt for me. I didn't hate it; at times I enjoyed it. But mostly I just slogged through it. I'll not be reading another of his many books on writing. I needed a book to help me review the basic English grammar, and after a quick search in the internet, I found this one. It is designed for the native English speakers who have a good understanding of the language, and only reviews some subjects that might be a little difficult for them. Foreign language speakers, like me, should find something else to teach them the basics, then proceed to books like this one. It had a fun and interesting tone, and I enjoyed listening to it, by the way. There were a lot of hilarious examples, and the language was refreshing and dynamic.
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This book is awesome. I believe that is all I need to say.
—Mikey15
a little cheesy but some helpful tips...
—silvergreen98
