Taking the form of a fable, this paper presents a discussion of the English language from the point of view of someone totally unknowing of its requirements. In the paper, an increasingly large cast of personified parts of speech make repeated visits to the "G. and P. (Good and Proper) Grammar Store." Sections of the paper discuss: nouns…

Many influential style guides endorse the stylistic prescription that writers, particularly technical writers, should revise noun compounds into phrasal or clausal paraphrases. While the prescription is well-intentioned, it fails to take into account that a reader's comprehension of compounds, whether long or short, is a complex process dependent…