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I heard this word today and had to look it up, so it has become the subject of today’s blog. The Collins English Dictionary & Thesaurus defines eponymous as: “(of a person) being the person after whom a literary work, film, etc., is named: the eponymous hero in the film of Jane Eyre.” “(of a literary … Continue reading
Words have two classes: content words and structure words. Content words Content words are the core words which give meaning to the sentence. They are the ones that we stress the most when we speak our sentences out loud. They can be nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs, according to the Oxford A-Z of Grammar and Punctuation by John … Continue reading
‘Kick the bucket’, ‘spend a penny’ and ‘Tom, Dick or Harry’ are all examples of euphemisms as they are words or phrases that people use to mask what they are trying to say. Graham King in his unique book Collins Improve your Writing says that euphemisms “paint a thick veneer over clarity and understanding” and that … Continue reading
I came across the word etymology today when flicking through Bernard C Lamb’s book The Queen’s English which gave me the inspiration to write today’s blog. Etymology is “the study of the sources and development of words” according to the Collins English Dictionary & Thesaurus. Studying where words come from, can help with spelling, for … Continue reading
It is common to find tautologies in writing and most of the time it goes unnoticed. The Collins English Dictionary & Thesaurus defines tautology as “the use of words that merely repeat elements of the meaning already conveyed, as in ‘Will these supplies be adequate enough?’ in place of ‘Will these supplies be adequate?’“. Graham King in … Continue reading
Hopefully is a misused adverb meaning “with hope”, according to Strunk & White in their book The Elements of Style. Strunk & White explains that this meaning “has been distorted and is now widely used to mean ‘I hope’ or ‘it is to be hoped’”. Here are some examples in sentences: I will get to … Continue reading
According to Cambridge Dictionaries Online http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/circa?q=circa, circa is a preposition word meaning approximately and is “used especially with years”. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circa explains that circa is also latin for ‘around’ and used quite a bit for historical writing. The shortened form can be written in any of the following ways (although the last two are only used … Continue reading
Have you heard of the word gerund? According to the Collins English Dictionary and Thesaurus, a gerund is “a noun formed from a verb” by using the present participle of a verb (ending in -ing) . Here are some examples: He is driving to work (driving in this sentence is a present participle) The driving range is five miles away (driving … Continue reading
A work colleague asked me what the plural of matrix was today so I guessed matrices, looked it up and I was right. This gave me an idea for today’s blog. Please find below some singular words – see if you can guess what their plurals are. The answers are at the end of the blog: … Continue reading
I almost got stuck on what to blog about tonight. After a full day at work, sometimes the brain just doesn’t want to take anything else in. I eventually decided on writing about the word just and its meanings. John Seely in his book the Oxford A-Z of Grammar & Punctuation, explains that just is an … Continue reading
My Writing Notebook 