The day my sarong fell over a news article

FMT's in-house grammar Nazi frequently comments on copies he receives from reporters and editors. This is one of them.

COMMENT

By The Grammarist

It’s known to every writer since Chaucer that the easiest way to get your readers’ attention is to put action into your sentence. That means you’ll do better with a verb that gives movement to your sentence than one that leaves it inert.

“James Bond looked at Pussy Galore with desire in his eyes” is a better sentence than “James Bond considered Pussy Galore desirable.”

That’s because the reader will instinctively use his mind’s eye to see Bond in the act of looking at Pussy. But it will be hard for anyone to see Bond in the act of considering. (In Goldfinger, Honor Blackman plays Pussy Galore.)

It was probably 20 years ago that I saw, for the first time in my life, a news intro in a certain online portal that used “want” as the verb of the main clause.

I was shocked out of my sarong because I had been told that the top editor was an experienced journalist. Since then, of course, everybody has been following suit, just as nearly every paper in town has been following another news portal in erroneously using “allude” as a synonym for “refer”.

If I were an armchair philosopher, I’d say such habits are here to stay. You see, if we tolerate bad taste for a length of time, we become acclimatised to it. We’ll reach a point where we see nothing wrong in it. Wait a little longer and we’ll even see it as good.

I know people who used to hate hip hop music, but because they hear it all the time from their children’s stereos, they have come to love it.

The thing about my sarong falling is not a figure of speech. When I read the article mentioned above, I laughed so hard that my chest hurt and I had to stand up.

If you’re a heavy smoker like me, you know that hard laughter is always followed by a fit of coughing. And that’s what happened. As my body shook, the loosely tied sarong fell to the floor. I wasn’t wearing a shirt or underpants. My daughters, who had entered the room to find out what it was that I found so funny, screamed in horror and disgust. That’s why I remember the episode so well.

I’m writing this because this morning, for the umpteenth time, I had to edit a story with a “want” intro.

It always amazes me that reporters don’t notice it when I change “want” to something else. I do it every time I see it. They probably think I do it without any good reason, that I change things for the sake of changing.

And they probably don’t like to use “urge” in place of “want” because they think it is too common and bland.

But I’ll take “urge” over “want” any time. At least, someone is doing something when he is urging another person towards an action. And the reader can see him doing the urging even if it is not a particularly picturesque action. But no reader can see someone being in a state of want.

How would a reporter know someone wants something unless the fella has asked for it? Why then can’t the reporter use “ask” instead of “want”? Asking is an action.

Sometimes, of course, the fella isn’t asking for anything. Sometimes he just calls for something to be done, but the reporter will say he wants something to be done.

Calling for something is an action. Whether he’s asking or calling, the guy has to at least open his mouth and the reader can easily imagine him doing it.

To put it in a slightly different way, when someone wants something, it’s not news. It’s not an event. But if he asks or calls for something, that is certainly an event.

It’s perfectly alright to use “want” in the subordinate clause of the intro, but never in the main clause.

For example, this is fine: “Mahathir has denied that he wants to stay on as prime minister indefinitely.”

The Grammarist works for FMT.