They say — those that have anything to say at all — that it is overused. I agree — in a way — but then — as any real writer knows — it is such a dashed comfortable habit. Once you’ve gotten into it, it isn’t easy to get out — you’re stuck for good. I have used them for as long as I can remember — though what book or set of books or magazine article or internet source got me going on them I will never recall. There are people who never use them — I am sure — and it is only when I take a good step back and look at my work from a very impersonal, schizophrenic viewpoint that I realise — very fully — just how much I use them.
Of course my liberality in the preceding paragraph was a gross exaggeration. But when I hit ‘find-replace’ on one of my documents (a 3,000-word section of an 80,000-word work in progress) and am told thusly;
‘ — ‘ 1 of 82
I do find myself feeling a bit sheepish, especially since an em dash cannot be used as anything but an em dash. No, 82 em dashes, and that is that. Still, it could be worse. I have made attempts to rectify the problem, and I have also made attempts to say that it isn’t a problem at all. If a certain author once decided that Capital Letters were entirely Useless, and therefore decided to spell Everything Without Them, this would be called Style. Should not we who use the em dash like a period ( or worse, like quotation marks, for there are often two on either side of the text) be allotted such distinction likewise?
The em dash’s primary usage is that of parenthetical insert, or a break of thought.
From the above-mentioned work, young adult novel Liergy, comes this line:
‘He having done what they wanted — turned the nation into a communist State — they wanted Zurigovia for their own.’
However, those of us who practice their use professionally know that there is a far greater scope to their utility. For example, that of a non-verbal conjunction (the one I use most often) as seen below:
‘He had held his own against enemies from all over — the Soviets, the Nazis, the former government, and even members of his own party who were too ambitious.’
It can also be used for aposiopesis (a sudden break at the end of a sentence):
‘No, no, I couldn’t—’
The American style guides suggest that an em dash should not be surrounded by spaces. This, I disagree with, for no other reason than that, aesthetically, such a formatting technique—done just so—looks as if one had strung together the words like hooks on a line. One exception in my book is aposiopesis, when it looks better to have no space before the dash.
When all is said and done, I don’t think I ever shall get over the beloved dash. I am told that it is used more in Russian than English — this is a result of the difference in grammar — but I may just skew the average.
What is the proper term for the exercise of this mania? Syncopation. If it isn’t in use yet, it should be.
