rant for heartofslash

[salixbabylon]

Excessive Reflexive Pronoun Use:

Reflexive pronouns are pronouns which refer to the subject of the sentence. They can be used to clarify what's going on (which is good) or to add emphasis (which is almost always bad and you should stop doing it immediately).

Aside from plain old mistakes and improper usage (see link below), the most common mistake is overuse.

ONLY USE REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS PROPERLY.
Used as direct object == GOOD!
Used as emphasis == BAD!

Good:
Aragorn was unwilling to commit himself to marrying Arwen until he had determined whether Legolas could get pregnant and provide heirs.

Bad:
Aragorn himself was actually completely gay.
-- This is correct but not needed! We know Aragorn was completely gay!

In short, excessive use of reflexive pronouns make it obvious that you are trying to sound elegant but actually make you sound like a dork who doesn't know English very well and is trying to impress people. Use reflexive pronouns very very sparingly for emphasis -- no more than once every 5 pages.

Or I myself shall come over and beat you yourselves' heads in. Thank you.


And this is the best page I found explaining it, once I realized I had confused myself. (correct - direct object)

Comments

[heartofslash.livejournal.com]

Bravo!! That was excellent. And an excellent link, as well. I hope everyone reads it and heeds it.

For me, the most irritating misuse is when people (like Orlando Bloom, who does this all the time - it could be his one flaw ;-) totally kidding - I'm sure he's ridiculously flaw-ridden say things like, "Eric and Myself were in the hot tub together..."

Let me reconsider that for a moment. If Orlando were to talk about being in a hot tub with Eric, I wouldn't give a rat's ass how many reflexive pronouns either of them used...

Good ranting!! More smut!!!

[salixbabylon.livejournal.com]

:) Glad you liked - it was something I had never really thought about enough to rant, but now I'm certainly going to be hyper-aware of it in my own writing.

And yes, I think the use of "myself" tends to be somewhat colloquial in British English, seeming "more proper" than it is officially.

But yeah, Orli can use all the poor grammar he likes if he's talking about being naked with his friends. :D