Can learning about punctuation really be fun? You bet--in Elsa Knight Bruno's Punctuation Celebration, featuring illlustrations by Jenny Whitehead Punctuation marks come alive in this clever picture book featuring fourteen playful poems. Periods stop sentences in a baker's shop, commas help a train slow down, quotation marks tell people what to do, and colons stubbornly introduce lists. This appealing primer is a surefire way to make punctuation both accessible and fun for kids.
"This is that rare audiobook that truly makes the print version come alive. The sound effects alone are priceless, with homage to Grammy Award-winner Bobby McFerrin. If you've ever wondered what punctuation marks sound like, Beach provides hilarious voices and sound effects for each one. A masterful, creative, amusing, must-have production that simplifies the rules of punctuation." -School Library Journal
The bestselling workbook and grammar guide, revised and updated! Hailed as one of the best books around for teaching grammar, The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation includes easy-to-understand rules, abundant examples, dozens of reproducible quizzes, and pre- and post-tests to help teach grammar to middle and high schoolers, college students, ESL students, homeschoolers, and more. This concise, entertaining workbook makes learning English grammar and usage simple and fun. This updated 12th edition reflects the latest updates to English usage and grammar, and includes answers to all reproducible quizzes to facilitate self-assessment and learning. Clear and concise, with easy-to-follow explanations, offering "just the facts" on English grammar, punctuation, and usage Fully updated to reflect the latest rules, along with even more quizzes and pre- and post-tests to help teach grammar Ideal for students from seventh grade through adulthood in the US and abroad For anyone who wants to understand the major rules and subtle guidelines of English grammar and usage, The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation offers comprehensive, straightforward instruction.
First published in 1905, German poet Christian Morgenstern's Im Reich der Interpunktionen (In the Land of Punctuation) is a comic poem on the flow of language--and the breaks in it. Punctuation signs are markers of pauses, interruptions, asides and stops. But they also point to intonation, intent and emotion ... a fact used brilliantly by Morgenstern to turn them into characters with their own agendas, in a drama that careens towards an inevitable end. It is a fun romp, and yet the political undertones are unmistakable, suggesting menacing systems of control. Adding a new dimension to the connection between marks and meaning, graphic designer Rathna Ramanathan illustrates this tranlated version of the poem with punctuation signs. She evokes older traditions like calligrams and the art of the Russian Constructivists, while developing her own ingenious--and very contemporary--idiom. Her visual grammar balances bold experimentation with precise communication, creating an artist's book at the crossroads of language, graphic design and politics. This signed, limited edition book has been silkscreen-printed and bound by hand on recycled handmade paper, at Tara Books' print workshop, run on fair trade practices."--Back cover.
Laugh your way through the season with more of those “epic fails, with frosting" from the creator of Cake Wrecks (The New York Times). From thankless Thanksgiving turkeys and confusing Christmas conundrums, to less-than-happy Hanukkah horrors and New Year’s meltdowns, Wreck the Halls has an icing-smeared disaster for every occasion. With additional chapters on Black Friday, family communication, and navigating the murky waters of politically correct cake greetings (Winter!), Wreck the Halls combines Jen Yates’s signature blend of wit and sarcasm with the most hilarious frosting fails this side of winter solstice. Get ready for some sweet relief from the holiday madness—and plenty of laughs.
The elements of style like you've never seen them before Explore the personalities of the punctuation marks we use every day with this bold, typographic journey through grammar. Each chapter in This is Me, Period introduces one of the major pieces of punctuation and all of its idiosyncracies, including: The dashing em dash— So-called "quotation marks" The colon: and on and on The shouty exclamation! The three dots of . . . (Don't forget the brackets) And even more As charming as it is educational, This is Me, Period helps you understand sentence structure in a novel way that keeps you turning the pages for more.
Bringing a poet’s perspective to an artist’s archive, this highly original book examines wordplay in the art and thought of American artist Gordon Matta-Clark (1943–1978). A pivotal figure in the postminimalist generation who was also the son of a prominent Surrealist, Matta-Clark was a leader in the downtown artists' community in New York in the 1970s, and is widely seen as a pioneer of what has come to be known as social practice art. He is celebrated for his “anarchitectural” environments and performances, and the films, photographs, drawings, and sculptural fragments with which his site-specific work was documented. In studies of his career, the artist’s provocative and vivid language is referenced constantly. Yet the verbal aspect of his practice has not previously been examined in its own right. Blending close readings of Matta-Clark’s visual and verbal creations with reception history and critical biography, this extensively researched study engages with the linguistic and semiotic forms in Matta-Clark’s art, forms that activate what he called the “poetics of psycho-locus” and “total (semiotic) system.” Examining notes, statements, titles, letters, and interviews in light of what they reveal about his work at large, Frances Richard unearths archival, biographical, and historical information, linking Matta-Clark to Conceptualist peers and Surrealist and Dada forebears. Gordon Matta-Clark: Physical Poetics explores the paradoxical durability of Matta-Clark’s language, and its role in an aggressively physical oeuvre whose major works have been destroyed.
Why do commas have so many rules? Does the period go before or after the quotation mark? How do I use an ellipsis? Is a semicolon much different from a colon? Find out the answers to these and all your other punctuation questions in To Comma or Not to Comma, the latest grammar book from Arlene Miller, The Grammar Diva.
