Multiple Verbitis
By Denise Loock Verbs create action and purpose in a sentence. As Patricia O’Conner observed in Woe Is I , without verbs, the other words in a sentence would be “standing around with their hands in their pockets . ” [1] But too many verbs in a sentence create confusion. When a writer uses many verbs in several forms to do the job of one verb, I call that manuscript riddled with disease ... multiple verbitis disease. Sometimes this ailment is contracted because of the author’s desire to sound scholarly, but often it’s the result of carelessness. Don’t despair. All writers and speakers contract multiple verbitis at some point, even the renowned statesman, Winston Churchill. He once quipped, “My most brilliant achievement was my ability to be able to persuade my wife to marry me.” [2] The sentence contains four verb forms. He could have said, “My most brilliant achievement was persuading my wife to marry me” (two verb forms). Public announcements a...
