Breaking the Rules (3)
Consider this sentence:
- I ate breakfast, then I went to school.
Is that sentence punctuated correctly? Absolutely not! By now you know that there are only two ways to join independent clauses:
- a comma, followed by a fanboy (, and)
- a semicolon (;)
The word "then" is not a fanboy; it's an adverb. Therefore, the sentence is incorrect. To splice those clauses correctly, we would have to rewrite it in one of the following ways:
- I ate breakfast, and then I went to school.
- I ate breakfast; then I went to school.
Nonetheless, many professional writers consider "then" to be an honorary fanboy, and they wouldn't object too strongly to using ", then" instead of ", and then" to splice two clauses.
It's another case of: If you know the rules of grammar, you are allowed to break them.
Here are some more examples:
- I washed the dishes, then I went to bed.
- Jim did his homework, then he watched TV.
- Margaret looked at her phone, then she went downstairs.
In this lesson, you will write write a sentence with two clauses. Join them together with "comma then" (, then).
Attention! If you write a sentence in which one person does two different things, restate the subject of the second clause!
Example:
- I did this, then I did that. (Yes, that's correct—the subject of the second clause is explicitly stated).
I did this and that.(No, that's wrong. The subject of the second clause has been left out).
Note: Keep in mind that you are writing a sentence that is grammatically incorrect! And you should probably never do it again—unless you become a professional writer. Only after you have mastered the rules of grammar are you allowed to break them! |
Instructions for the Quiz
Write a compound sentence with two short clauses. Splice the clauses together with "comma then" (, then), as in this example:
- I washed the dishes, then I went to bed.
Caution: If the subject of your clauses is the same, you must repeat the subject each time! Study the following examples:
- Wrong: I ate a bagel, then started my book.
- Correct: I ate a bagel, then I started my book.