A Grammarian's Funeral

Here's an excerpt from Robert Browning's poem "A Grammarian's Funeral," which was originally published in 1855 (that's Browning at right). To read the entire text, click here.

. . . Others mistrust and say, "But time escapes:

          Live now or never!"

He said, "What's time? Leave Now for dogs and apes!

          Man has Forever."

Back to his book then: deeper drooped his head:

          Calculus racked him:

Leaden before, his eyes grew dross of lead:

          Tussis attacked him.

"Now, master, take a little rest!" not he!

          (Caution redoubled

Step two abreast, the way winds narrowly!)

          Not a whit troubled,

Back to his studies, fresher than at first,

          Fierce as a dragon

He (soul-hydroptic with a sacred thirst)

          Sucked at the flagon.

Oh, if we draw a circle premature,

          Heedless of far gain,

Greedy for quick returns of profit, sure

          Bad is our bargain!

Was it not great? did not he throw on God,

          (He loves the burthen)

God's task to make the heavenly period

          Perfect the earthen?

Did not he magnify the mind, show clear

          Just what it all meant?

He would not discount life, as fools do here,

          Paid by instalment.

He ventured neck or nothing heaven's success

          Found, or earth's failure:

Pāṇini, the Ancient Indian Grammarian

"Wilt thou trust death or not?" He answered "Yes:

          Hence with life's pale lure!"

That low man seeks a little thing to do,

          Sees it and does it:

This high man, with a great thing to pursue,

          Dies ere he knows it.

That low man goes on adding one to one,

          His hundred's soon hit:

This high man, aiming at a million,

          Misses an unit.

That, has the world here   should he need the next,

          Let the world mind him!

This, throws himself on God, and unperplexed

          Seeking shall find him.

So, with the throttling hands of death at strife,

          Ground he at grammar; . . . 

What's a dangling modifier?

Here's an example taken from the pages of the New York Times:

"Now, after starting a new life in Altamira, the government is telling her she needs to leave again, this time to make way for the Belo Monte dam, which will flood a large swath of this city, displacing thousands of people." (August 15, 2010)

"A classic dangler. She, not the government, started a new life."

The example and the comment are taken from the Philip B.Corbett's After Deadline blog, which is published on Times' website every Tuesday.  After Deadline examines questions of grammar, usage and style encountered by writers and editors of The Times. It is adapted from a weekly newsroom critique overseen by Philip B. Corbett, the associate managing editor for standards, who is also in charge of The Times’s style manual.

Correct English

George Eliot, Middlemarch (1877):  " Correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays."