How can you begin to improve upon the rough first draft of a letter or a report that obviously needs additional work? My August column offered one answer: review and apply four rhetorical forms that ...

Gerunds are the -ing form of a verb, and infinitives are the to + base form. These words can be confusing; they combine the meaning of a verb with the grammar of a noun. My father asked me to phone ...

The dictionary definition of a participle is; ‘a verb ending in –‘ing’ (present) or –‘ed’, -‘en’, -d, -t, -n, or -ne (past) that functions as an adjective, modifying a noun or pronoun. A participial ...

“Rebel With a Clause” celebrates the improbable cross-country journey of a woman who gently imparts grammar rules to strangers. Ellen Jovin, wearing a “Grammar Is Groovy” T-shirt, is the star of ...

Meticulous: ever-scrupulous about minute details, very careful, accurate. This definition of the word is one that I thought correct, for it comes from the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English ...

Oh, dear. It had to happen sooner or later: a direct clash with Chronicle editorial authority over a point of 19th-century prescriptive grammar. My Our esteemed editor, Heidi Landecker, who has saved ...