In this lesson,
you'll learn that well-written English sentences--even long ones--usually
express one main idea. You'll also get some suggestions for revising
your own sentences for unity by cutting and revising sentence structure.
English Sentences
For a very useful
discussion on the basic types of English sentences, read Chapter
5, Lesson 4 Sentences of this handbook. Also make sure you
understand the differences between complete sentences and fragments,
because we are going to move beyond that discussion in this lesson.
Sentences are
the most vital units of written English. They can make statements
and ask questions; they can command and undercut authority; they can
communicate authority or fear or skepticism or unrest or beauty or
hope; they can be elegant and ramble; they can confuse and clarify
and infuriate and persuade. Again, what you do with your sentences
depends on your purpose and the expectations and needs of your audience,
but there is probably nothing more important you can do to develop
your own style than to become the most proficient sentence writer
you can be.
Sentences used
to be called "periods." This term is useful, because it gets at the
idea of the sentence as a cycle. Think of the sentence as a prose
unit that begins, moves, and stops. A voice announces a subject, says
something about it, and ends. In other words, each sentence, when
it is working, should complete itself. It is normal in speech and
in the drafting process for writers to combine too many ideas in one
sentence, since the goal of both kinds of communication is simply
to get ideas (or feelings) expressed. As many writers will tell you,
writing is often less difficult (and less exciting) than revising.
This is because you can work toward more ideal goals and standards
during the revision process: you can evaluate your word choices, cut
and combine sentences, alter sentence structure, and make other changes
to help organize your writing into a structure that your readers will
understand and admire.
Revising for
Unity by Cutting
Limiting your
tendency to free-associate and digress (both when you speak and draft
writing) may cause writer's block. However, evaluating your sentences
in the revision process will help you organize your thoughts into
forms and structures that will best suit the needs of your audience
and purpose. Here's an example of free-association and digression
at work in typical speech. Imagine that you've just run into a classmate
from high school. You call your best friend on the phone and say something
like this:
You wouldn't
believe who I saw at the post office! It was Austin Whitherspoon!
Do you remember him, from tenth grade English? I hardly recognized
him; he looked so different, talking on his cell phone in this million-dollar
suit and who knows where he got it. We used to think Austin was
kind of goofy--well, everyone did. But I always had a kind of crush
on him. I didn't want to tell anyone, since they always sort of
joked about him, calling him names, but I always liked Austin. I
looked a mess. I was wearing sweat pants, but I gave him my phone
number, anyway. And my email address. I sure do hope he calls.
The message of
this paragraph is perfectly clear--we understand several important
details about the "character" Austin and the feelings of speaker,
as well. For this reason, there would be no need for the speaker to
"revise" her conversation with her friend. If, however, our speaker
decided to write a personal essay about her encounter with Austin,
she would need to revise in order to make the information more unified,
and thus more clear or accessible to a reader.
She might begin
by evaluating her point of view (see Lesson
1, Point of View). Here, she's using the second person--the
point of view of direct address. Since the second person puts the
most focus on the reader (or, in this case, the listener) of the reader-writer
exchange, and since a real reader would probably not be a person who
went to school with Austin Whitherspoon, this writer should probably
first revise by putting the entire experience into the first person,
since that would put the focus on herself, rather than the reader
or the topic. We can tell that the true focus of this exchange is
in fact the speaker's feelings for Austin, since in her monologue
she gradually moves from talking about Austin to talking about herself.
This writer could
also revise her conversation by investigating her sentences for unity.
Here's one sentence from the paragraph:
I hardly recognized
him; he looked so different, talking on his cell phone in this million-dollar
suit and who knows where he got it.
Notice that there's
a digression in this sentence from the topic of how different Austin
looked to where he may have gotten his suit. Since it makes no difference
to the meaning of the sentence where Austin's bought his suit, that
part of the sentence probably should be omitted. That would give us:
I hardly recognized
him: he looked so different, talking on his cell phone in his million-dollar
suit.
This revision
helps because it unifies the goal or purpose of the sentence. Notice
that the revision from the colon to the semicolon helps the writer
put emphasis on the main subject of the sentence, which is how different
Austin looked.
Exercise
Revise
this sentence from the paragraph for unity, and then compare your
answer to ours.
I didn't want
to tell anyone, since they always sort of joked about him, calling
him names, but I always liked Austin.
Revising for
Unity by Changing Structure
We can revise
sentences for unity by altering the structure we use, as well. Is
there a clear connection in your own sentences between your subjects
and predicates, or is your point being lost under a sea of modifiers?
Here's an example of a sentence that a revision of structure could
easily improve:
The woman at
the bus station, who was wearing a hat and at least three skirts
piled one on top of the next and kept taking an envelope out of
her purse and staring at it, was my aunt.
This simple
sentence mainly wants to communicate that the woman at the bus
station was the writer's aunt. But, because there is so much information
separating the subject--woman--from its predicate and objects--was
my aunt--the sentence loses its power. We could revise for unity
by altering the structure of the sentence:
When I saw
her at the bus station, my aunt was wearing a hat and at least three
skirts piled one on top of the other. Because she kept taking an
envelope out of her purse and staring at it, I realized she was
confused.
By breaking our
sentence up into two complex sentences, we have grouped the
information being conveyed into units that are more direct and unified.
The dependent clause in our first revised sentence announces a speaker
(I) and a subject (the aunt), while the independent clause in that
sentence describes (or elaborates on) that subject. The dependent
clause opening the second sentence in our revision continues to describe
the subject (my aunt opening the envelope), while the independent
clause closes the information being conveyed with a realization (that
she was confused). In this revision, both sentences contain subordinate
information important to the writer's meaning, but because the new
structures rearrange the information, this subordinate information
no longer confuses or overwhelms the main job our first sentence was
asked to do.
In this example,
we have turned one compound sentence into two complex sentences and
have thereby organized information for the sake of unity. But we can
also turn complex sentences into compound sentences, if doing so would
help us clarify meaning:
Because my
father never went to college, he had to work hard all his life just
to take care of my sisters and me, and wanted more than anything
else for us to go.
Although modifiers
are not weighting down this sentence, it is not as clear as it could
be because it is trying to convey too much information. We could revise
by breaking it up into compound sentences:
My father never
went to college, and had to work hard all his life just to take
care of my sisters and me. For this reason, he wanted more than
anything for us to go.
The first sentence
in this revision turns a complex sentence into a compound one, thereby
unifying the information. The second sentence in this revision begins
with an introductory clause that works as a transition between the
two sentences, and ends on the writer's main point. This revision
reveals that the most important place in a well-written English sentence
is often (though not always) its end.
Exercise
Try
to revise the following sentence by altering its structure, then click
to compare your answer with ours:
Even though
she worked all her life and scrimped and saved, Eliza lived always
on the edge of the poverty line, what with her seven children and
the cost of shoes and school and her many illnesses, one of which
was diabetes, if I am not mistaken.
Summary
Well-written
English sentences generally communicate one main idea. You can revise
your sentences for unity by cutting and by altering sentence structure.
