Seb from Inverness
sent in a question over when to use that
and when to use which. I know this is
something that vexes many writers, so hope the answer helps.
Seb says: I’m not a
novice writer by any means, but I can never decide what the rule is over that
and which. Is there a simple way to remember?
Okay, the basic rule is this: if the sentence doesn’t need the clause (it makes sense
without) you use which. If the sentence does
need the clause you use that.
The car, which is green, has a manual gearbox.
The car that is green has a manual gearbox.
The two sentences look identical at first, but the meanings
are not the same.
The car, which is green, has a manual gearbox. This tells us
there is only one car and it has a manual gearbox. The clause (the words inside
the two commas) isn’t necessary to illustrate the meaning. It is additional
information and doesn’t affect the fact there is only one car and it has a
manual gearbox.
The car that is green has a manual gearbox. This sentence
suggests there is more than one car, but it is the car that is green that has the manual gearbox. The phrase ‘that is
green’ is necessary to show clearly of all the cars on the forecourt, it is the
green one that has the manual gearbox.
The proper phrase for it is a restrictive clause because
another part of the sentence depends on it. You can’t remove that clause (that
is green) without changing the meaning of the sentence.
Nancy, who is
currently living in Barcelona, is doing a non-fiction writing course. As she
says: living abroad, it’s not always
easy to carry out research. Do you know of any good reference sites?
As I wasn’t sure what topic or categories would be of benefit, I’ve
collected a range of online reference sites, all of which are useful for those
of us who have limited access to English language libraries and museums, but
are equally useful to readers who aren’t resident abroad.
Dictionaries
Ask Oxford
has built a database on grammar, usage and words, as well as giving a quote of
the week, word of the day, spelling help and origins of words and phrases. http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/
Cambridge dictionary is useful: http://dictionary.cambridge.org/
Merriam Webster www.merriam-webster.com/ is another
good online dictionary and http://thesaurus.reference.com/ is useful
when an alternative word is needed.
Quotes and
Sayings
www.quotesandsayings.com/ is a
wonderful site to find quotes by subject or author, excerpts from speeches and
poetry, and a good selection of proverbs and sayings. The site also provides
the full text of several books by Arthur Conan Doyle and the following works by
Shakespeare: All's Well that Ends Well,
As You Like It, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, The Merchant of Venice, The
Taming of the Shrew, The Tempest
and his Sonnets.
Museums
www.24hourmuseum.org.uk is a
gateway to various UK
museums, galleries and heritage attractions.
www.britishmuseum.org/ provides
access to a database of about 5,000 artefacts from the British Museum's
collections.
www.cornucopia.org.uk/ produced by
the Museums, Libraries and Archive Council, this is an online database of more
than 6,000 collections in the UK's museums, galleries, archives and
libraries.
www.iwm.org.uk/ The
Imperial War Museum covers conflicts from the First World War to the present
day.
www.museumspot.com/ is an
American site that provides information on museums and galleries worldwide.
www.nationalgallery.org.uk/ the
National Gallery Search allows you to explore by artist, subject, theme or
title.
www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk/ the
National Museum of Photography, Film and Television gives details of the
collections which include the world's first negative and the earliest
television footage.
www.npg.org.uk/live/index.asp the
National Portrait Gallery lists collections by name of artist or sitter, by
medium, or by subject.
www.nhm.ac.uk/ the Natural
History Museum has details of the museum's collections, information about
research, details of services and access to the catalogue.
www.tate.org.uk/ the Tate
Online gives access to works in the Tate Modern, Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool
and Tate St Ives.
Fee-paying
sites
The British Library http://www.bl.uk/ gives online access to this incredible resource and offers copies of
documents for a fee.
www.britannica.com/ is the
online version of Encyclopaedia
Britannica.
----
Lorraine
Mace is the humour columnist for Writing Magazine and a competition
judge for Writers’ Forum. She is a former tutor for the Writers Bureau,
and is the author of the Writers Bureau course, Marketing Your Book. She
is also co-author, with Maureen Vincent-Northam of The
Writer's ABC Checklist (Accent Press). Lorraine runs a private
critique service for writers (link below). She is the founder of the Flash 500
competitions covering flash fiction, humour verse and novel openings.
Her debut novel for children, Vlad the Inhaler, will be published in the USA on 2nd
April 2014.
Writing as Frances di
Plino, she is the author of the crime/thriller series featuring Detective
Inspector Paolo Storey: Bad Moon Rising, Someday Never Comes and Call It Pretending.
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