Grammarly... is it wrong?

[KeithD]

I may be old, but I still have all my adult teeth. We can continue when yours come through.

Is there an English translation available for that?

 

[gordo12]

So, this sentence:

“On your knees bitch, and start sucking.”

Grammarly wants the comma. Word sez no way. Nothing required.

What say you?

 

[KeithD]

So, this sentence:

“On your knees bitch, and start sucking.”

Grammarly wants the comma. Word sez no way. Nothing required.

What say you?

Either, depending on how you want it read. It's a sentence where the subject and verb are "understood" in the first clause and the subject is "understood" in the second, so all normal grammar rules, which is probably what the Word program is stuck with, are off and context kicks in. Computer programs can only handle a limited amount of varying context.

Think it's fine to do it either way.

 

[ElectricBlue]

So, this sentence:

“On your knees bitch, and start sucking.”

Grammarly wants the comma. Word sez no way. Nothing required.

What say you?

Either for me - would depend on the emphasis wanted and the cadence of the sentences around it. I'd probably tend to go no comma, though, if I thought about it too much.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

So, this sentence:

“On your knees bitch, and start sucking.”

What say you?

I say if you have a comma after bitch, you need one before it, too.

Actually I'd push for one before bitch, and consider an exclamation mark or full stop after. And then a sentence fragment starting with And.

The 'bitch' needs to be separated off from the 'get on your knees and start sucking', where a comma before 'and' would be optional.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I say if you have a comma after bitch, you need one before it, too.

Actually I'd push for one before bitch, and consider an exclamation mark or full stop after. And then a sentence fragment starting with And.

The 'bitch' needs to be separated off from the 'get on your knees and start sucking', where a comma before 'and' would be optional.

Actually, thinking about it, I tend to agree this ^^^^. Even more to the point, maybe:

"On your knees, bitch. Start sucking."

Not that I'd be so impolite .

 

[XerXesXu]

I say if you have a comma after bitch, you need one before it, too.

Actually I'd push for one before bitch, and consider an exclamation mark or full stop after. And then a sentence fragment starting with And.

The 'bitch' needs to be separated off from the 'get on your knees and start sucking', where a comma before 'and' would be optional.

More alts:

“On your knees, bitch … and start sucking.”

“On your knees, bitch … start sucking.”

 

[XerXesXu]

duplicate

 

[KeithD]

I say if you have a comma after bitch, you need one before it, too.

Yeah, I agree. I was only looking at the comma that was there, in terms of the clauses, and I missed the missing one to set off the direct address.

As far as the comma that was pointed to, the OP was asking how to properly punctuate a rendering that was what he wanted to write, not to provide someone else's alternative on how to write it. There's nothing wrong with putting it all in one sentence. Giving alternate wording isn't responding to the question.

 

[SimonDoom]

Agree with Kumquatqueen. There should be a comma before "bitch."

I love the fact that we are talking about comma use in that sentence. Only here.

 

[gordo12]

Yeah, I agree. I was only looking at the comma that was there, in terms of the clauses, and I missed the missing one to set off the direct address.

As far as the comma that was pointed to, the OP was asking how to properly punctuate a rendering that was what he wanted to write, not to provide someone else's alternative on how to write it. There's nothing wrong with putting it all in one sentence. Giving alternate wording isn't responding to the question.

I was puzzled by the disagreement between Grammarly and Word. Your explanation helped.

Actually, I don't mind the alternative. I would have only put a comma in front of bitch if it was the end of the sentence. Then I would have dropped the "and". It's not a bad thing for people to offer additional thoughts.

It's the beauty of writing. So many possible alternatives for such an ugly sentence.

I think I've got it. Thanks for the help!

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Grammarly has misunderstood the sentence (not surprisingly) and treated it as consisting of two independent clauses.
Consider it without the interlocution of 'bitch:'

"On your knees, and start sucking."

With the comma, this would suggest that the two are independent actions. If, however, you consider them part of the same action, the comma wouldn't be necessary:

"On your knees and start sucking."

Interlocuting the "bitch," requires it be set off by commas before and after:

"On your knees, bitch, and start sucking."

Both commas can 'belong' to "bitch;" Grammarly's single comma only 'belonged' to the sentence's clauses.

 

[Ezeerider]

Foot, mouth, insert. You have a bad habit.

Say aloud the words:

'lets + eat + grandma' Do you hear any apostrophes, commas or capitalisations. No, because they're not properties of grammar. The sentence is perfectly comprehensible without them, disambiguation is by context. Are you addressing grandma, or your sibs and/or first cousins?

The typographical marks on the written word are "Style'.

Write out 100 times

'It's interesting to me to see the continual hostility that so many writers at Literotica have toward a publisher's style.'

If you're not going to use a publisher, why should you conform to their style? To appease the style trolls?

Writing is a creative process. In the 21st C anyone can publish. They can use stylistic markings creatively, or leave them out where they serve no purpose. A better, more elastic, more inclusive style will probably emerge, that serves the needs of the screen, rather than paper.

Join the future.

My first suggestion here was going to that you should at the very least engage in some form of self-editing before you post your opinions. However, since it is obvious that you are averse to any form of self-discipline, based upon many of your various comments, I will refrain. Far too late for that, I suspect.

But let's take it from the top, just for shits 'n' giggles (I recognize the hopelessness of the intent and the enormity of the task, but not being one to suffer a fool gladly, I will offer some examples) and point out some of the faults - or chasms - in your reasoning.

You began with, "Say aloud the words:.." and with that, immediately invalidated your following argument, since the discussion here is of the rules and conventions of grammar in writing. We're speaking of the written word and its structures.

However, in speech, you do indeed hear the various instructions and information provided by punctuation. That's precisely why we have developed the system(s) over the course of literary history. To ignore or omit them results in the kind of chaos you encounter in 'stream of consciousness' writing, as in, say, Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury - which, we must note, is "a tale told by an idiot." Just try speaking to anyone while omitting any form of punctuation in your speech while doing so. Watch for reaction.

Perhaps the fact that you mistake punctuation for "typographical" marks is indicative of the nature of your problem, but I fear it goes far beyond that.

So, no, the "typographical" (sic) marks and a failure to recognize their purpose and to properly employ them are not by any stretch a form of "style". It's just a demonstration of ignorance on several levels.

"If you're not going to use a publisher, why should you conform to their style? To appease the style trolls?"

Let me help you here by offering this small, but very important point for this bit of discourse: Neither punctuation nor grammar in English, or any other language, was invented by any publishing house, present or past. The rules of the game are the rules of the game, whether or not you submit your stuff to one publisher or another. However, if you plan to offer your stuff for wide distribution without knowing or adapting to the rules, and you hope to find some acceptance, you might do a search for something like, say, Bumpkin Publishing, or Illiterates' Press. You get the idea.

Yes, as you observe, "... In the 21st C anyone can publish. They can use stylistic markings creatively, or leave them out where they serve no purpose. A better, more elastic, more inclusive style will probably emerge, that serves the needs of the screen, rather than paper."

As others in previous posts have also observed, the quality of writing has suffered enormously as a result - to say nothing of the torrent of misinformation that has come with it. (And no, they're still not "stylistic markings," though I'm sure you wish ever so hard that they were.) Screen or paper, it matters not; the rules remain the same though the medium may be different.

Now, as a purely practical matter, consider this, if you will. In writing fiction - and especially erotica - you must first bring in your reader through your art, and place him or her in the place and situation you've crafted, so that they come under the spell of your magic, imagining themselves to be there in the scene with your characters. They're cruising along with you, their hormone levels rising with those of the story's erotic scenario and ..... SPLASH! Cold water in the form of some error of tense, time, typo or one of punctuation that changes the meaning of your intent. Each blunder is a pothole on the road to erotica. You've defeated your own purpose and, far more importantly, cheated your reader out of what was implicitly promised when you posted your story.

So for the sake of those readers, here and elsewhere, find yourself a good editor and allow him or her to help you. There are a number of them right here on the site, willing and able to give you the help you need. That way you needn't embarrass yourself (knowingly or otherwise), until you have in fact done the work that allows you to become a real writer, ready for publication. You will do all involved a great service; especially yourself.

And yes, I have made my living as both a published writer and editor. And I paid a lot of dues to do it. There ain't no free lunch. You've got to put in the time and work to build your chops. Otherwise, just keep striving for mediocrity.

 

[gordo12]

So my solution is this:

"On your knees, Bitch! Start sucking."

The angry tenor of the dialogue seems to demand an emphasis on Bitch. Plus I believe as a direct address it should be capitalized. Like "On your knees, Susan! Start sucking." Sorry, you wouldn't have known about the tenor of the dialogue preceding it. My bad.

 

[ElectricBlue]

You've got to put in the time and work to build your chops. Otherwise, just keep striving for mediocrity.

Agree this (and thanks for your enjoyable long post). It's the point many of us constantly make, in response to those who (just as constantly) say good grammar doesn't matter - there are conventions for a reason, the main reason being, they work.

These grammar nihilists are like "carpenters" making wobbly chairs with blunt saws and rubber hammers. It might look quaint and rustic, but you wouldn't sit on it (and they're not carpenters).

 

[ElectricBlue]

So my solution is this:

"On your knees, Bitch! Start sucking."

The angry tenor of the dialogue seems to demand an emphasis on Bitch. Plus I believe as a direct address it should be capitalized. Like "On your knees, Susan! Start sucking." Sorry, you wouldn't have known about the tenor of the dialogue preceding it. My bad.

Not unless Bitch is her actual name - it's not a conventional title like Sir, or Mister.

The exclamation mark provides the emphasis on its own, I think.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Not unless Bitch is her actual name - it's not a conventional title like Sir, or Mister.

The exclamation mark provides the emphasis on its own, I think.

Yep, this. If you really wanted to add emphasis you could capitalise the WHOLE WORD, but not just the first letter.

 

[gordo12]

Yep, this. If you really wanted to add emphasis you could capitalise the WHOLE WORD, but not just the first letter.

Not a bad idea. I must admit I'm looking at the whole section now and thinking of deleting it. It's bothered me since I wrote it and maybe all this is a hint I should ditch it. I'm putting it aside for a couple of days to think it over.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Not unless Bitch is her actual name - it's not a conventional title like Sir, or Mister.

The exclamation mark provides the emphasis on its own, I think.

In a BDSM relationship, Bitch might be her name. In a cuckolding one, Bitch might be his name! Just saying!

 

[XerXesXu]

Hi Ezeerider, thank you for troubling to respond, and especially for the time and effort you seem to have taken.

I'll make some short points in response.

Does it anaesthetise or does it entertain? That’s the ‘acid test’ for good writing. All other matters are secondary, because, if your reader falls asleep you cannot engage, you cannot inform, you cannot educate.

In my opinion, you fail that acid taste. I find it, impossibly hard, to believe that you ever made a living as a writer, or in publishing. I believe you once worked in a hospital.

Now. You show me yours, and I’ll show you mine. What are your credentials in Linguistics?

Recall that, originally, Simon asserted that no one would ever say “Me went to the store.” Within the next few stories I read on Lit I found that construction twice. “Me and X went.” Most publicly, you’ll recall Emma using that construction in her gracious speech accepting the US Open trophy. “Me and Leylah (verb).” It’s a commonplace spoken construction. It is grammatical, a comprehensible construction in speech.

By weasel words, you seek to imply that grammatical style is grammar. No, it’s not. Grammatical is an adjective, style is a noun. Grammatical style is as much style as punctuation, and it’s house style. Anyone seeking to publish in the mainstream uses a house style. There are many of them. The old adage is, “The great thing about standards is that there are so many of them.” But, just because one is spoiled for choice doesn’t mean that you can’t want more. I want more; I want better.

NB: You make a point about “style” being an impediment to masturbatory pleasure. As one of the least pleasant parts of a previous life, I needed to review the wank sheets of nonces and rapists, I can assure you that, for professional wankers, it’s all about content, they’re insensitive to style.

 

[KeithD]

“Me and Leylah (verb).” It’s a commonplace spoken construction. It is grammatical, a comprehensible construction in speech.

Please provide some authority that holds that construction ("me" first) as grammatical. It isn't. I use it to identify the undereducated--and, yes, there are a whole lot of undereducated folks walking about. There aren't many eighteen-year-old women pro tennis players who are English grammar authorities.

Do you use that construction in your writing?

 

[XerXesXu]

Please provide some authority that holds that construction ("me" first) as grammatical. It isn't. I use it to identify the undereducated--and, yes, there are a whole lot of undereducated folks walking about. There aren't many eighteen-year-old women pro tennis players who are English grammar authorities.

Do you use that construction in your writing?

Please re-read my response to Ezeerider with care. You'll find all your answers there.

 

[XerXesXu]

I took the plunge yesterday, and tried Grammarly, free version, having used Hemmingway, online, up to now.

They’re fundamentally different types of program. Hemmingway’s designed to look up a list, count and report. Grammarly’s in its 13th year. It’s an evolution of a neural network, with a training set, and a trainer. What you get out depends on choice of training set and adjustments to targets set by the trainer. I was horrified to see reference to the word ‘genitive’ in a suggested solution. I had to have Latin and French to matriculate, but I’d guess that most users of Grammarly haven’t been put to that trouble. It’s telling though, about the nature of the trainer.

Grammarly doesn’t have a native English understanding of nouns and determiners, particularly in relation to uncountable nouns. It’s very keen on hyphenating two words to create one, or running them together. But, it can’t tell the difference between ‘on to’ and ‘onto’.

It has no opinion on, blow job v blow-job v blowjob. It didn’t recognise the word ‘depraved’, but I added it to the dictionary. Another indication of the training set.

Lots of little things, it confuses laundry (a place) with laundry (dirty clothes), and so on.

It tends to over-regularise, not regularisation errors, but clunky English.

It has a variable geometry set-up. Some are experimental, some premium only. Particularly useful is the ability to select regional English, also to select out text in quotes. You wouldn’t want to be down-voted on your Eng. Lit. essay because you quoted Chaucer and Shakespeare. But, it also enables you to select out dialogue and polish your narration.

I quite like some of the features of Grammarly, but it’s not a native English speaker - yet. It identifies errors correctly, and suggests solutions, but often sub-optimal solutions. It struggles with commas, usually, the optimal solution when it suggests removing a comma, is to add one elsewhere.

The Word plug-in causes my version of Word (2003) to malfunction.

Now, to the point. Correctness and Clarity, I get; Engagement and Delivery I don’t get. I can conceive a metric for the first two, but not for the second two.

Hemmingway is more intuitive, and the metrics are obvious.

I see that if I pay for the Premium version of Grammarly they have 499 more suggestions to make. Is the added value obvious? 499 suggestions – it must be – no? The usefulness of the suggestions made by the free version do not convince me that they’ll be that useful. Does anyone pay for the Premium version? Can you say what value it adds?

Grammarly Premium is $30 a month 0r $144 a year. Hemmingway3, is free online, or $19 forever, downloaded to your computer.

Does anyone have an opinion after comparing the two?

 

[KeithD]

Please re-read my response to Ezeerider with care. You'll find all your answers there.

Apparently you don't want to respond to my post. Fine with me. Just want others reading the board to realize that you are off the wall.

 

[SimonDoom]

Recall that, originally, Simon asserted that no one would ever say “Me went to the store.” Within the next few stories I read on Lit I found that construction twice. .

No educated person writes this way. People do speak this way sometimes, and when they do they reveal that they are uneducated. It's an appropriate construction in a story (1) in dialogue, revealing that the speaker probably is an uneducated person, and (2) in narrative, to reveal that the narrator is uneducated.

Grammar is not a matter of right and wrong, black and white. It's a complex of conventions, to enable and enhance communication, between the writer and the reader, and the speaker and the listener. The pronoun "me" is objective case, rather than subjective case. No educated, knowledgeable writer uses it as a subject in narrative, unless for a specific purpose.