As I was decompressing in front of my TV Saturday night—a long way from my weekday copyediting mode—I never expected to be exposed to grammar. But I was—twice. The first time, I was watching Jeopardy!  One of the game categories was Grammar, and amazingly all five questions were easily and quickly answered, including one on the proper form of a noun or pronoun to use in front of a gerund and another asking contestants to complete the correlative conjunction not only/but _____.

Considering how often I find myself correcting these very same constructions in texts we are about to publish, I was amazed at the contestants’ knowledge (at least two of them participated in answering the category of five questions). So for those of you not up on this topic, a noun or pronoun in front of a gerund should be possessive. Most of us have no question about the correct form when using pronouns; it’s the nouns that trip us up. So if in doubt, a good test is to substitute a pronoun for a noun to see what sounds right to your ear.            

            We appreciate your taking the time to write.
            James’s running off at the mouth was not appreciated by his mother.
            The cat’s pouncing on the bed awakened her.
            He disliked Susan’s ruffling his hair whenever she passed by.

As for the correlative conjunction not only/but also, I suspect that I insert also, or its equivalent, more times than not while copyediting text. Here are some examples from recent articles in National Geographic, though I don't remember which ones were right to begin with:   

            . . . shapes not only Indonesia’s landscape but also its beliefs
            . . . head-to-head not only with the authorities but also with his boss
            . . . not only for waterfowl but also for woodcock, snipe, and doves
            . . . ensures not only ecosystem integrity but also social viability

After Jeopardy! I flipped around the channels for a while, resting briefly on a PBS channel showing Bob Dylan performing in the 1960s. No grammar there, but it was, nostalgic, and powerful, to see Joan Baez and Peter, Paul, and Mary on stage with Dylan, singing “Blowing in the Wind” and to remember all the angst and emotions of those Vietnam years. I can take Dylan only in small doses and soon flipped to another station and watched the 1947 film The Ghost and Mrs. Muir.

That’s where the second grammar lesson of the evening happened, as Mrs. Muir, a young widow played by Gene Tierney, corrects the ghost of swashbuckling Captain Daniel Gregg (a young Rex Harrison): “different from, not different than,” she tells him. I wondered, would anyone today, in 2008, know what she was talking about? Maybe it doesn’t matter. Just lean back and enjoy the movie, I told myself.

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