The Semicolon

Grammar from Lesson 14C.

Do not use a semicolon between parts of unequal grammatical rank, such as a clause and a phrase or a main clause and a subordinate clause.

NOT: Lucy has three topics of conversation; her courses, her career, and her travels.

BUT: Lucy has three topics of conversation: her courses, her career, and her travels.

Semicolon

Lucy has three topics of conversation; her courses, her career, and her travels, not, but: Lucy has three topics of career conversation, her truck needs a valve job, Harvey, the dormitory clown, and the bridge under construction. The bridge was under construction, not that it needed a valve job; it needed career and travel plans; it needed a hot tank with gasoline in it. Harvey needed a valve job; along came Harvey; we heard about the final decision to take a detour to the dormitory. Along came Harvey and Lucy, who needed lab jobs; they went jogging one afternoon, never returning, and are numbered among the tens of thousands who disappear every year. "The educational TV channel is never boring," said the missing Lucy. The report is true; Lucy is traveling.

(ca. 1985-86)