EATS, SHOOTS & LEAVES Cutting a Dash--The Radio Series That Inspired the Hit Book

Oh, to be in England. Or rather, oh, to have quotidian access to BBC4 radio productions such as “Cutting a Dash,” the hit series about punctuation that inspired the hit book EATS, SHOOTS & LEAVES. Thank goodness all six episodes are available as a classy audio production. Swinging jazz riffs introduce each segment; background noises color scenes set on city streets and in children’s classrooms; and through it all, the crisp, humor-filled voice of comedy writer/literary editor Lynne Truss gives us permission to laugh aloud while being shocked, yes shocked, about the disastrous state of punctuation and grammar in the modern world. Notice my use of the semicolon, a punctuation mark that Truss has caused me to reconsider. I have learned that Greek dramatists gave the world the comma, colon, and period; that the second comma in that string is known as an Oxford comma; and that it incites much debate. I have also learned that society’s overuse of the apostrophe may indicate its imminent demise. So, I plan to join Sticklers United to fight punctuation-imprecision and to play my copy of EATS, SHOOTS & LEAVES until it wears out. A.C.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine [Published: OCT/ NOV 04]