Ernest Gowers Quotes

United Kingdom, Author
June 2, 1880 – April, 16, 1966.

Sir Ernest Arthur Gowers GCB GBE is best remembered for his book Plain Words, first published in 1948, and for his revision of Fowler's Modern English Usage. Before making his name as an author he had a long career in the British civil service, which he entered in 1903. His final full-time appointment was as Senior Regional Commissioner for Civil Defence, London Region. After the Second World War, he was appointed chairman of numerous government inquiries, including the 1949 Royal Commission into Capital Punishment. He was also chairman of the Harlow New Town Development Corporation.

I was in favour of the death penalty, and disposed to regard abolitionists as people whose hearts were bigger than their heads. Four years of close study of the subject gradually dispelled that feeling. In the end I became convinced that the abolitionists were right in their conclusions...and that far from the sentimental approach leading into their camp and the rational one into that of the supporters, it was the other way about.

Ernest Gowers
- Death
- Feeling
- Hearts
Be clear, be brief, be human.

Ernest Gowers
- Human
- Clear
- Brief

That it is a solecism to begin a sentence with 'and' is a faintly lingering superstition. The OED gives examples ranging from the 10th to the 19th c.; the Bible is full of them.

Ernest Gowers
- Bible
- Sentence
- Solecism