Every elementary school student is taught never to start a sentence with but. But why? Teachers of young students often warn against beginning with but or and simply as a way of avoiding a verbal crutch. All mature writers develop an instinct for what tone they’re going for, who their audience is, and what kind of style their content demands. But there’s no universal rule against starting a sentence with the word “but.” This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “”But” at the Beginning of Sentences”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, my name is Marcus Smith, and I’m from McKinney, Texas.
Hi, Marcus. Welcome.
Hi, Marcus. How are you doing?
Well, I have a question that surrounds beginning sentences,
Spoken or written, starting with the word but.
And I should say that my wife and I actually have a question.
We have kind of a bit of a wager surrounding the answer.
A wager?
What’s on the line?
Well, if my wife is more correct than I am, of course, because there could be a kind of a continuum where neither one of us is perfectly right.
But if she is more correct than I am, then it will be distilled almond oil with an organic vanilla extract foot rub.
Ooh.
Yes.
Wow.
So, and if I am more correct, then it will be kind of a shoulder rub and pampering afternoon for me.
Wow.
And what do we get if we answer the question?
Yeah, there we go.
Yeah.
I want some grass here.
Well, I guess I could send you a sample of that oil.
Sound like you like that.
Yeah.
This is wonderful.
You can’t send back rubs in the mail.
So, yeah, she’s right.
Well, so let me say, basically, I made the assertion, my wife and I were chatting the other day, and she is in charge of upper elementary education, a kind of an elite school for third through fifth graders.
And then I myself am becoming a writer,
And so I made the assertion that spoken sentences could start with but,
But only following some other immediate spoken statement,
While written sentences could start with but regardless,
Because you could go after an implied kind of an accepted state,
Like, you know, but despite the sunny day, Martin felt a chill.
So it might be a bit redundant, but still maybe legitimate.
But Laura said that spoken words are looser than written ones,
That you could start a verbal clause with but,
And she cited some rhetorical choices by some past speakers,
But that when writing you had to have some other phrase antecedent
In order to use the word but, even if it was a prior paragraph.
So, for example, the second paragraph could begin, you know, but if we accept the above,
You know, et cetera.
And what was interesting was that our 11-year-old daughter, Kirsten, we have three girls, and
Kirsten chimed in, weighing in on her mother’s side, because she said that for verbal communication,
You could have an implied verbal antecedent.
You know, so, for example, if I hand her a pizza slice on a napkin, but otherwise said
Nothing, she could respond,
But father, I would prefer my pizza
On a plate.
This is how your children talk?
Well, that’s how she
Phrased the example.
But no, they don’t normally walk around
Speaking that way, but you know,
When crafting kind of that formal example,
That’s what she put together.
Okay. Wow. You guys
Are giant nerds.
And we like that.
I’m moving in. Do you have a spare room?
Just thought you’d like to know.
Because these are the kind of conversations I like to have.
Absolutely.
Let’s break this down into a nutshell.
My first response is all mature writers develop an instinct for this kind of thing that allows them to use but in a place where an elementary school teacher might have a problem with it.
This is just breaking it down.
And all of these arguments for and against using but at the beginning of a sentence are all, in certain circumstances, correct.
It is completely about the writer, the audience, and the content.
That is what it is about.
And I know that in a fifth grade class, a teacher might say, don’t begin your sentence with and or but.
Well, that’s because students have a problem with that.
They have a continuous thought.
They throw an and or but in there to link.
Yeah, they just string it all along.
Yeah, just to string it all together.
And then this happened.
And then that happened.
And then, yeah.
But, yeah.
And then sometimes to introduce like an artificial drama, they’ll throw them in a but because it’s oppositional to what came before.
And it just feels dramatic to them.
They’re like, I need a but in here.
Just to kind of like umbrella everything that you said.
But is right in some circumstances,
But there’s no universal law on that.
There can’t be universal law on that.
I think there’s going to be a lot of massaging
Because I think we’ve met in the middle.
Yeah, I think you probably have.
Yeah, a lot of massaging.
We agree that spoken and written language
Are basically different things.
They have different rule sets
And nobody should ever speak like they write
Or they’ll probably be stoned to death
By people who say, don’t be pretentious.
I just like, if you speak like you write,
You sound alien.
You sound like a weirdo.
But as an adult, I would use but at the beginning of the sentence.
I wouldn’t feel compelled to try to make it sound more lofty with something like however.
Right.
You know, I think some people try to do that.
They try to sound more sophisticated.
That makes sense.
Well, great.
Well, thank you very much.
Marcus, thanks for calling.
This was a stimulating call, and I’m really glad to hear that these kinds of conversations are happening in families instead of what SpongeBob said.
Well, you know, I once had a mentor tell me that whenever you encounter an interesting problem,
You just don’t set it aside.
You should really mull it over and try to come up with an answer.
I agree.
Yeah, let it marinate.
Thanks, Marcus.
Bye, Marcus.
Take care now.
Take care.
Bye-bye.
