Book Review: Eats, shoots and leaves

Book: Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation
Author: Lynne Truss
ISBN: 1-86197-612-7
Reviewer: Madibeng Kgwete

Posted on 24 July 2007

On the same day that I got Lynne Truss’ book, Eats, shoots and leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, as a present, a former schoolmate e-mailed me and several others the resolutions of the South African Communist Party’s [SACP’s] 12th National Congress.

On the first page of the resolutions was a sentence I found to be objectionable. In bold, capital letters, the sentence read: “COMMUNISTS TO THE FRONT FOR A BETTER SOCIALIST WORLD”.

I found the sentence vague, so I replied to the sender, thanking him for the information before I put it to him that: “Truthfully speaking, there is no ‘Socialist World’”.

As I paged through the book, with particular attention to the chapter that emphases the importance of using commas when writing sentences, I realised that, had the writer of the SACP statement put a comma between the words “better” and “socialist”, the meaning would have been different.

The sentence would have read: “COMMUNISTS TO THE FRONT FOR A BETTER, SOCIALIST WORLD”. A “better socialist world” is a completely different thing from a “better, socialist world” – and I believe the SACP meant the latter in their bold statement.

You firstly need to have a “socialist world” if you want to build a better one. Which is why I found the “better socialist statement” vague because, in reality, there is no socialist world at the moment.

Let’s say, for example, that we have two people: one wants to build “a better socialist world” whilst another wants to build a “better, communist world”.

These two people will have two different objectives. The former already lives in a socialist world and wants to improve it. The latter wants to build a world that is better and that is socialist.

Had the writer of the SACP resolutions heeded the many calls made in the book about punctuations and how necessary they are, I would not have had the argument with my schoolmate who, knowing very well that I like reading, sent me the SACP resolutions.