Language Johnson
Housekeeping announcement
Where's the style book?
Jul 29th 2011, 17:58 by R.L.G. | NEW YORK
SOME readers may be confused about the whereabouts of The Economist's style guide, which was online until several days ago. We have recently migrated to a new content-management system. This is a very good thing for us, but several things have disappeared in the transition, including the style guide. It will be back soon. In the meantime please take a look around this language blog, Johnson, if you haven't discovered it yet. Among the postings are many old discussions of our house style, and much more besides.
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For anyone else who may come along:
http://web.archive.org/web/20110106082039/http://www.economist.com/resea...
This is the last cached version of the previously posted style book. Obviously, it isn't formatted in the same manner as the current Economist site, but as far as I can tell, the links are all still active within the cache and the information provided still as useful as ever!
Is the style guide lost forever?
I found this. Is this the same? http://www.frzee.com/Education/The%20Economist%20Style%20Guide.pdf
Hi -- I still can't find your style guide. This means I & my foreign students are doomed to sound too American. Help!!
Hi -- I still can't find your style guide. This means I & my foreign students are doomed to sound too American. Help!!
Is it up yet?
Cheers ~
Hopefully the styleguide isn't dead?
Dear Sir
Life without your compulsively readable Style Guide is a toe-curling experience. When one can no longer access wild geisers of Economist's creative energy, their literary metabolism slows down to a pace that would put snails to shame.
Stop booting this matter into the long grass! Your piercingly misjudged and breathtakingly miscalculated attempt to rob us of acces to the Guide to the Erudite Heaven, this human right and gift from Athena (and other deities of knowledge), is tantamount to an intellectual catastrophe.
It is difficult to image how a genie of your readers' discontent and disappointment can now be stuffed back into its lamp. It's time to pull up your organisational socks and let the Style Guide roam free the pastures of cyber space.
With best wishes,
Your, hopefully temporarily, linguistically hobbled readers.
The Economist's consistent avoidance of the split infinitive interests me in particular. No other publication I know of pays any mind at all to this somewhat obscure rule, violation of which I have (for better or worse) adopted as a personal pet peve of mine.
"It will be back soon." was written on Jul 29, 2011. So, I'm just wondering, how soon is soon?
Refering to the front page of your magazine dated November the 26th-2nd December 2011. Wich shows a Euro Coin burning up in a metheoric fassion.
It is my oppinion that your illustration is in poor taste.
Millions of Europeans have thier live savings invested in the Euro.
Your statement on the magazine reads; "IS THIS REALLY THE END?" this sort of sesationalistic headline does not help confidence in the Euro.
It is the end?, for my subscription to your Magazine it,REALLY!is
I hereby wish the Euro all the luck it needs.
And from now on look forward to reading The Frankfurter Algemeine.
Aufwiedersehen
... this guy *really* needs the style guide; please help them Economist!
How soon was "soon" meant to be?
If "moon" is 30 days (or 28 whatever), a "soon" (also "sun") would be 365 days... and 6 hours.
Having revisited this page in the hope of the reappearance of the style guide, I have come to a somewhat sinister conclusion, which should be obvious when reading between the lines of this post.
While readers may have been confused in July, they are now certainly disappointed if not irate. Content does not "disappear" in content-management systems, it is just no longer published. Hence the promise of "...back soon" was vacuous and premature. One has to suspect that Johnson was not privy to the editor's plans for the style guide. Perhaps falling physical book sales might be the reason? Certainly taking "a look around this language blog" - interesting as it may be - is no substitute. Likewise, still having a link to the Style Guide on the menu in the home page footer is ridiculous.
Perhaps The Economist could consider finally bringing out digital editions of the style guide. We could all use it on tablets, smart phones and even as an add-in to word processing applications. Then charge users a subscription of £1 per annum for regular updates. We would all gladly pay.
Perhaps most irritating is the fact that neither Johnson nor anyone else at The Economist seems to read, let alone respond to, readers' comments. We expect more.
Seriously, have been waiting a bit too lo000000000000000ng for it to come back!
Still no sign of it?
Still unavailable on Economist website? Thank God for the 'way back machine;' you can find it here
http://web.archive.org/web/20110721214431/http://www.economist.com/resea...
Is the style guide coming back anytime soon? I wanted to send a link to my English pupils but sadly it's still offline.
It has been an interminable "soon".
When will it be back?
Try this hyperlink, courtesy of our friends at Wikipedia.
http://web.archive.org/web/20110721214431/http://www.economist.com/resea...
Thank you so much for this link: like everyone else, I'm enormously peeved about the disappearance of my style bible: I have the print copy but prefer to have it open online in my Bookmark bar.
It's been a while now. When will the style guide be made accessible again? I need it to settle questions about grammar, punctuation or usage that friends and colleagues bring up from time to time.