Quick hits (and misses)

Add comment December 13th, 2008

The weekend is here, so I don’t have a lot of time. Here are a few quickies on stuff that comes up often:

Use the adverb “presently” to mean “soon,” not “now”: “The first day of winter will be here presently.” If you must use a large word to mean now, try “currently.” However, in clear writing the verb tense usually makes such a word unnecessary. In any event, don’t use “presently.”

For times that aren’t now, use “before” instead of “prior to” and “after” instead of “following.” “Prior to” should be reserved for when you want to sound pretentious. And “following” has other work to do, as in placing one thing behind another — in space rather than time.

And don’t use “author” as a verb. It’s a wonderful profession and a great noun, but try “write,” “compose” or “create” when you need to describe what an author does.