PUNCTUATION AND A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY.

PUNCTUATION AND A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY. Paul Collins in the article I linked to yesterday points out that in the 18th century punctuation was not used to express grammar or to relate clauses, but to indicate “oratorical pauses” He cites a 1737 guide which describes the length of the pause associated with each punctuation mark. At Nick’s suggestion, during our recent vacation in Europe I read with plesure Laurence Sterne’s A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY (in full, A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY THROUGH FRANCE AND ITALY BY MR. YORICK), which was published in 1768. In addition to recommending it, Nick pointed out that the liberal use of dashes on every page of Yorick’s narrative expresses the book’s approach to travel and to life. Yorick uses multiple dashes to convey his changes of mind while on his travels. The pages are splashed with dashes; many sentences contain multiple dashes. Yorick changes his mind from minute to minute.