Words should be right, not almost-right

This post was published in the Wilson Times Dec. 14, 2019

“The difference between the almost-right word and the right word is really a large matter — ‘tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning,” Mark Twain said.

I spent most of my working life trying to find the right word or trying to explain to subordinates why the words they used were not right. The distinction was never as clear as lightning bug and lightning. Although I had earned a college degree in journalism and English, I had much to learn about the subtle differences between words that sound or are spelled alike. Several books devoted to correct word usage expanded my education.

In the 1970s, I read two books by television newsman Edwin Newman, “Strictly Speaking” and “A Civil Tongue.” Newman’s clear and often amusing explanations of word usage made me a crusader for proper usage. Both books are still available online. The Associated Press Stylebook teaches AP writers and subscribing newspapers the difference, for example, between a lectern and a podium. Often known as the newspaper’s bible, the Stylebook is a resource I still turn to, a decade after leaving the newsroom.

But there are other books that will make you an unctuous corrector of verbal errors (and I do mean verbal, not oral — there’s a difference). Perhaps the best I can recommend is “Words on Words,” the alphabetical listing of words that are often misused compiled by John B. Bremner. This author conducted a class on correct word usage that I attended more than 35 years ago. He sold me after the first five minutes. The man — a former Catholic priest turned Journalism professor at the University of Kansas — knew his stuff and presented it in a delightfully entertaining way. The class I attended was part of a national tour sponsored by the Knight (newspaper) Foundation. Bremner died in 1987 at age 67.

When subtle differences in meanings arise between words, I turn to Bremner’s book, the AP Stylebook or (for really difficult issues) H.W. Fowler’s 1944 “Modern English Usage.” Fowler is written for the harshest of teachers with a very British perspective. Some of his explanations of correct usage are so thorough you’ll wish you never asked.

For someone who wants only a practical guide with simple explanations, I would recommend the “AP Stylebook” or “Words on Words.” Any teacher of any scholastic discipline should expect correct usage in their students’ writing. Using the wrong word in a history or sociology class should be penalized the same as it would be in an English class.

What’s the big deal? Are these the rantings of a handful of snobbish elites who like to say, “You mean lie, not lay”? As I told reporters when I was an editor, “Would you hire a carpenter who didn’t know how to use a hammer or saw? Your tools as a writer are words and punctuation. You have to know how to use them. Fortunately, you can look up most things.

Dictionaries, like encyclopedias, have gone on-line in the digital age, and I use a dictionary app on my computer for quick checks of word meaning or similar words (in thesaurus mode). This feature has made my writing more efficient because it’s quicker to use the dictionary app than to pull the dictionary off the shelf and thumb through the pages to the questioned word. But for more thorough understanding of correct usage, printed guidebooks, such as “Words on Words” are still important. Unlike a dictionary, these usage books explain how a word differs from similar words.

As with dictionaries or encyclopedia, usage books can be so intriguing that a user can easily get lost in the details. Aren’t words wonderful?