Monday, June 16, 2008

Criminal Sentence 37: "There Are" Better Ways to Say It

Writers love the phrase "there are" (or "there is"). For example:

"There are three girls standing over there."

This is just wordy. I feel it's almost always best to cut out unnecessary cases of "there":

"Three girls are standing over there."

Many times, you can get rid of a boring "to be" verb (such as "are" and "is"):

You can turn "There are six students who attend the school"
into
"Six students attend the school"
and you save three words.
at

4 comments:

  1. AnonymousJune 16, 2008 at 4:02 PM

    I just read your article from WD. Excellent job! Glad I found you!

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Sentence SleuthJune 16, 2008 at 5:18 PM

    Thanks, Susie! Which article did you read? Are you taking the lesson to heart? Let me know if you have any questions.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJune 16, 2008 at 8:02 PM

    Um, I think I meant to write, "I just read your article IN WD."

    I'm a published author and yet I'm suddenly feeling very self aware! Ha ha

    Next time I'll move a little slower and check my work before I post.

    I look forward to reading your blog.

    Thanks so much~

    ReplyDelete
  4. The Sentence SleuthJune 17, 2008 at 8:29 AM

    Sure thing! I welcome any of your comments.
    Bonnie

    ReplyDelete

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