Verb Tense Consistency |
A Touchstone for Good Writing
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Today’s The New Indian Express | Editorial
#newspaperinlearning #essaywriting
2nd Nov 2023
What makes an article so appealing to the reader?
Quite Simple! Its consistency in verb tense!
Something that we often tend to overlook many a time!
A lack of tense consistency means that, you start a sentence in one tense but end up in another.
Let’s look at this insightful Editorial article in today’s The New Indian Express, to see, to admire and to appreciate the consistency in verb tense by the veteran journalist Kajal Basu.
The author begins with ‘Do’ you think?
‘Do’ as we know, is in the PRESENT TENSE.
So the author consistently sticks to the ‘present’ tense, throughout his article, and concludes his article in the PRESENT TENSE as well!
Shifting from one verb tense to another is okay only when you want to cite from a past event or incident.
Else, jumping unnecessarily from the present to past or vice versa is not good, as it might make your writing sound chaotic, unsettling and confusing as well.
So here we go -
So yes! Shifting
from one verb tense to another is okay only when you want to cite from a
past event or incident.
That’s
hence this entire paragraph is in the past tense, as it cites from a past event.
The author then comes back to the ‘present’, and hence continues to use the present tense consistently, from then on, throughout his article, which adds more appeal and credibility to the content!
And
now for the summing up by the author, which is yet again, in the ‘Present tense’,
as well, the same way he started off his article.
Shifting
from one verb tense to another is okay only when you want to cite from a
past event or incident.
Else, jumping unnecessarily from the present to past or vice versa is not good, as it might make your writing sound chaotic, unsettling and confusing as well.
In short -
Do not jump, unless and until it is really really necessary! 😊
I still remember you saying this in our PG class. And since then, I'm always practicing it.
ReplyDeleteThat's great. So happy to know that. Thank you Tony. Best wishes.
ReplyDelete