Crazy Sentences!

As an editor, I have run across some crazy sentences written by authors. Sometimes they were intentional, but other times not so much. Here is a few favorites mine that made me smile just a bit.

John wood always remember and wood treasure these memories.

Aside from using the noun “wood” instead of the auxiliary verb “would” this sentence had a lot of remembering and not a whole lot of structure. It was also the opening of a short story. I convinced the author to drop it in favor of something that made sense.

This next sentence is actually grammatically correct. It came from a joke by the famous Groucho Marx. I simply love it.

One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I’ll never know. 

I hate run-on sentences. People get lazy and forget that someone might have to read them one day. Here is one from a book I worked on a few years ago.

We got to the cabin and we unpacked our things and we built a campfire and we made dinner and we slept under the stars for the first time and the next morning we felt like we never had before.

What can you say about that sentence? It clearly makes use of the word “and”.  If you are wondering if this one was the worst I have seen? Nope, but it does make my point. Write cleanly and clearly.

This last sentence is one that uses the word “read” and “read”. While there is actually nothing wrong with it I did convince the author to revise it.

The next morning John read in the newspaper about the man who had to read the article to the judge.

Crazy stuff, not bad …but still… What did he change the sentence to?

The next morning the newspapers told the whole story. John was happy that he didn’t have to read the article to the judge.

Of course, I have many more examples of this and maybe someday I will share them with you. Let me know if you liked this.

-Ron

This Week’s Podcast: On the show this week we have The Shadow in a story called House Of Horrors. It is a classic radio story. You can listen to this podcast on Thursday at Ron’s Amazing Stories, download it from iTunes, stream it on Stitcher Radio or on the mobile version of Spotify. Do you prefer the radio? We are heard every Thursday at 10:00 pm and Sunday Night at 11:00 PM (EST) on AMFM247.COM. Check your local listing or find the station closest to you at this link.

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