Taking grammar too seriously

[spudtater]

Assuming you're not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition, then what's the correct way to say "Please choose the page to link to"?

I get "Please choose the page to which to link", which makes me sound a bit like an owl...   8^)

Comments

The kind of English up with which I will not put

[gominokouhai]

> makes me sound a bit like an owl

Sadly, that's the correct formation. Consider rephrasing.

OTOH you are permitted to end a sentence with a preposition these days---the rule is deprecated. Don't worry about it too much.

[stormsearch.livejournal.com]

Your version is indeed correct. Try putting a colon in, thus:
"You need to link to a page: Please make your choice/Please choose one..."

[sigmonster.livejournal.com]

"Please choose the page to link."

"Please indicate, in such detail as to render identification unambiguous, the location, site, page, or object to which a link ought (if, having regard to all legal and technical matters of relevance, this be possible) to be created."

[spudtater.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I don't like the first option. "Link" should always take two objects, surely?

[sigmonster.livejournal.com]

I think this is the difference between a transitive and an intransitive verb. All the best verbs are transitive and since "link" is getting so much more use these days, it's time it became transitive.

I know the dead metaphor from the noun usage, link of a chain, is slightly opressive, but I really would write just "Please choose a page to link" here. Comes down to personal preference, though.

[spudtater.livejournal.com]

> it's time it became transitive.

So, "I linked the Wikipedia article on my journal"? "The W3Schools tutorial links W3C guidelines in several locations"?

Hmmm... makes me shudder, somehow.

[digitalraven]

"Please choose the link's destination page."

[fizzyboot.livejournal.com]

Assuming you're not supposed to end a sentence with a preposition, then what's the correct way to say "Please choose the page to link to"?

That is bad advice. Specifically, it is advice up with which you should not put.

It is perfectly OK in English to end a sentence with a preposition.

So, how did the silly idea that it's not come about? 18th century prescriptive grammarians, basically. These people looked at the grammar of Latin and said "English doesn't follow the same grammar rules as Latin! Therefore English is bad!".

There is in fact a perfectly good reason why English doesn't follow latin grammar: English is a different language to Latin, with a grammar of its own.

(Incidently, this is also the reason why people who are ill-educated or unsure of themselves say things like "It is I" instead of the much more natural (and IMO more correct) "It is me".)

[spudtater.livejournal.com]

I am aware of this, however you have to admit that — correct or not — ending a sentence with a preposition sounds slightly less formal.

[fizzyboot.livejournal.com]

It marks it as informal. However, I don't see that as a problem unless you are going to be evaluated by people who're ill-educated or insecure because of their grasp of English or insecure because their social status (e.g. lower middle class).

I endeavour to write to say what I want to say clearly. (I don't always succeed).

[brucec.livejournal.com]

There are certain ways of writing that have passed into general acceptance, such as writing "for free", which annoy a minority of people; there are others that still annoy a lot of people, like the message that landed in my Inbox from Informatics the other day, entitled "London Event Invite - Lecture & Reception". The reason some people find incorrect sentences annoying is because it clashes and makes them pause to understand the meaning.

[spudtater.livejournal.com]

A fair point — everything comes down eventually to clarity and unambiguity.

In this instance, I see "...to link to" as far more clear than "...to which to link", so despite its slightly less formal tone, I would choose the former.

("Invite" grates on me too — if you must shorten a noun, please don't choose an existing verb.)