Commas- opinion?

I know I can use commas weirdly. Just a question though, which one does everyone think is more correct because I’m not certain and I’d like to know :slight_smile: :

Remember, John. (As in John, try to remember)
Come, John. (As in John, come with me).

Or

Remember John.
Come John.

Should there be a comma between the two words or not?

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Definitely include the commas. Or at least, that’s what I do. I’m a high school drop out so what do I know? It just makes me cringe when they aren’t there, haha.

Plus, I think without the comma, they have different meanings. “Remember John,” is saying “Don’t forget that person named John,” whereas “Remember, John,” is telling John not to forget something.

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Yeah, those commas belong in those sentences.

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Thanks guys :smile:

I’ve got one more. With a word that has a missing letter replaced by an apostrophe, do you capitalise it if it’s at the start of the sentence. (I’ve seen it written both ways.)

For example:

'Tis the season.

Or

'tis the season.

Capitalise at the start of sentence IMO. If in doubt use grammarly.com and set it to your desired English variant. It’ll give basic hints on grammar for free. I have it set to British English and use the plugins for firefox/chrome/Vivaldi and Outlook/Word.

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On the note:

Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8600.Eats_Shoots_Leaves

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Panda: Eats, shoots and leaves /groans/
Using puns to teach punctuation :smile:

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Never underestimate the power of good grammar!
For example:

Writer: Hey, is it “first hand” or “first-hand”?
Editor: Either’s fine.
Result:

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Oh and the story begins “Eager students…”. Even better. :smiley:

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The classic example:

“Let’s eat, Grandma,” said the kids.

“Let’s eat Grandma,” said the cannibals.

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I’d like to thank my parents, Ayn Rand and God.

(Oxford comma ftw.)

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I think, in my honest opinion, I use way too much commas when it comes to writing, even for a simple sentence, like this.

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Nah, you’re just one comma too much.

If I ever post it, you should see my story, pretty sure I have lots of commas…oops, did it again.

For the purposes of your question, the first two with the commas is correct, but it depends on context. The second set are more like questions than commands. “Remember John” is asking a third party to remember John, not asking John to remember something. “Come John” doesn’t really make any sense, though. It ought to be “Is John coming?” if it was meant to be a question to a third party. A reader might infer that from the question above it. Possibly. Unless… it was part of a bedroom scene, then it might make sense. :wink: I’ll assume that is not the case, though, since it would still be wrong.

A good way to remember commas and how to place them is that they are meant to be natural breaks in a sentence; those moments that, when reading a script aloud, someone would naturally break or change tone. That is how people know where the breaks and changes of tone are in a script. It’s advisable to read your work aloud and see if it feels right to say. Narrate it, effectively. If it doesn’t feel natural to speak, something is wrong somewhere, usually wherever it starts getting uncomfortable to read aloud. Language is meant to flow effortlessly, and not to be a chore.

Anyway, that’s enough of a lecture for one day, I think. :sweat_smile:

Well I cant say much but lemme show the importance of commas

I feel it’s important not to censor art.image

I mean, I believe we have minors around here.

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… Daym! Dat Stalin is FIIIIINE! :heart_eyes:

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