Miss Thistlebottom's Hobgoblins
The Careful Writer’s Guide to the Taboos, Bugbears and Outmoded Rules of English Usage

Most people look back fondly at their early school years and wonder whatever became of their childhood mentors. But when Theodore Bernstein was contacted by his grade school English teacher, Miss Thistlebottom, he took the opportunity to show her that her rigid teaching of antiquated rules regarding English usage and those like her have left most people feeling bound up in a writer’s straightjacket.   Bernstein isn’t an English usage anarchist.  But when “…everybody goes out into the world with a flat rule:  Don’t split infinitives…for those whom writing is an art or a necessity (and the two are not mutually exclusive), the rule is too confining; it’s like telling a driver, ‘Never go more than forty miles an hour.”    Is there ever a time when it’s okay to split an infinitive?  There certainly are times when going over forty miles an hour is okay…even a necessity… In four letters to his old teacher, Bernstein addresses Witchcraft in Words (Can there be more than two alternatives?); Syntax Scarecrows (Can something grow smaller?); Imps of Idioms (Is it head over heels or heels over head?) and Spooks of Style (Can you end a sentence in a preposition?) and forces Miss Thistlebottom to face the error of her ways. 

MISS THISTLEBOTTOM’S HOBGOBLINS is an indispensable reference guide for anyone serious about writing.   The scores and scores of entries in this book are witty, intelligent and have plenty of illustrative back-up to help break you free in your written communications.   Read through Bernstein’s manifesto and cast off the hobgoblin induced inhibitions that lack validity and cramp your writing style.  Split an infinitive—end a sentence in a preposition—use a word in a new way—you’ll never write the same way again.

back to top

Author Profile

Theodore M. Bernstein was the editorial director of the New York Times Book Division, taught journalism at Columbia’s School of Journalism for 25 years and served as a consultant on usage for the Random House and American Heritage dictionaries.  He has written several books on English usage, most notably, THE CAREFUL WRITER.

back to top