'Whomever' is harder for people who good at grammar

 “I’ll hire whomever does best in the interview.” 

“I’ll hire whoever does best in the interview.”

People who aren’t trying to use good grammar, often choose “whoever” in a sentence like this. People who are being careful often choose “whomever.” Ironically, the folks who weren’t trying get this right more often than people who are trying. The correct choice here is “whoever.”

Grammar buffs get this wrong because they have only half the picture. They know that “whom” and “whomever” are object pronouns, but they don’t understand that whole clauses can be objects, too.

Object pronouns are words we use every day and include “me,” “him,” “us” and “them.” They’re often objects of verbs, as in “show me,” “invite him,” “tell us” and “ignore them.” Or they’re objects of prepositions like “at,” “to” and “with”: “yell at me,” “send to him,” “relate to us,” “go with them.”

They’re the mirror image of subject pronouns “I,” “he,” “we,” “they,” etc., which we use as subjects: “I yell,” “he sends” and so on.

“Whom” is an object pronoun, “You sent it to whom?” and “who” is a subject pronoun, “Who sent this?” Similarly, “whomever” is an object pronoun and “whoever” is a subject pronoun. But because these two often sit between clauses, there’s a twist that some people don’t realize.

Compare: “Police will arrest whoever breaks the law” and “Police will arrest whomever they catch breaking the law.”

In both cases, the pronoun comes right after the verb “arrest.” So if you apply a simple understanding of pronouns, you would guess you need “whomever” there because it’s an object. But in that second sentence, the word after “arrest” is not the object. The whole clause that follows “arrest” is the object, and that clause needs its own subject: whoever.

For a super-simple example, look at the sentence: I saw who did it. The object of the verb “saw” is the whole clause “who did it.” If the pronoun were the object, you’d have to say, “I saw whom did it.”

Even professional writers, editors and broadcasters get this wrong. A lot.

Look at this sentence from the Aug. 22 New York Times sports section: “He talks to whomever wants to hear about the story of the hat.”

Either the editor didn’t understand object pronouns or the writer made a mistake and the editor didn’t catch it. He or she clearly thought that the preposition “to” needed to be followed by an object pronoun. But in fact, the object of the preposition “to” is the whole clause “whoever wants to hear about the story of the hat.” That’s because “wants” needs a subject and only “whoever” can fill that role.

Anytime you see a “whomever” sandwiched between two clauses, ask yourself if the second verb has a subject. In “Police will arrest whomever they catch breaking the law,” the subject of the verb “catch” is “they.” Clearly, we don’t need to swap “whomever” to “whoever” to do the catching in the verb. But in “Police will arrest whoever breaks the law,” there’s no other word that could be the subject of “breaks,” so “whoever” must be it. Here's the full story in my recent column.

When a comma and a possessive s collide

A while back, an AP Stylebook online subscriber wrote: “Please, no recasts. I cannot find a definitive answer anywhere on the planet. Keep in mind these represent directly quoted utterances. Do we keep or toss the comma after France’s, New York’s and 2001’s? ‘Alice said, “Paris, France’s, sights are breathtaking!”’ ‘Gov. Cuomo said, “Albany, New York’s, crime rate has risen exponentially.”’ ‘Joe said, “September 11, 2001’s, tragic events will be indelibly etched in the minds of everyone.”’”

These are interesting questions because they create a conflict between comma rules and good taste. Comma rules say that when you refer to a city followed by its state, then continue the sentence, the state is followed by a comma. For instance: Albany, New York, is lovely this time of year.

The same rule applies to countries after cities: Paris, France, is home to the Eiffel Tower.

And the same rule applies to years after dates: September 11, 2001, was a tragic day.

But sometimes, especially in casual speech, people can make New York, France or 2001 possessive. New York’s weather is nice this time of year. France’s president will visit. 2001’s events affected us all.

This is almost never a problem, but when the rules call for a comma in the same spot, things get unsightly and a little weird. Notice how, in “Paris, France’s, sights are breathtaking,” it sounds more like you’re talking about France’s sights than Paris’. A similar effect is true for the other two sentences.

Rulebooks like the Associate Press Stylebook don’t tell you what to do in these situations. So subscribers sometimes just pose the question to AP’s editors on the stylebook’s website. Usually, this works out great. But not this time.

“Really, truly, recasting is the thing to do,” replied an editor.

I don't love this answer. I explain why in my recent column.

Can 'include' introduce all the parts?

I suspect that every writer I edit held a meeting to decide they would all misuse “include” at the same time. It’s the only possible explanation for the sudden rash of sentences like “The sandwich ingredients include bread, peanut butter and jelly.”

The problem is as much about logic as it is about grammar. In my culinarily simplistic world, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches have exactly three ingredients. Nobody’s getting creative with pesto aioli or salted caramel. Yet “include” seems to suggest that an incomplete list will follow — merely a few examples of the bounty of flavors and textures you’ll find in a PB&J.

According to Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary, “include” means “to take in or comprise as a part of a whole or group.” Personally, I find that a little confusing. But “part of” is clearly central to the meaning. Bread, peanut butter and jelly aren’t “part of” the ingredient list for a sandwich. They’re the whole list. So “include” doesn’t make sense according to this definition.

When “include” isn’t introducing a list, there’s little confusion: “Maria arrived just in time for us to include her in the meeting.” Obviously, people other than Maria were involved. She couldn’t be included in a meeting in which she was the only attendee.

A lot of language commentators feel strongly that “include” refers to just a subset of a whole, not every part of it. “‘Include,’ which has traditionally introduced a nonexhaustive list, is now coming to be widely misused for ‘consists of,’” says Garner’s Modern American Usage.

But, like all things in language, “include” gets controversial. “There are quite a few commentators,” says Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, “who maintain that ‘include’ should not be used when a complete list of items follows the verb.” This reference book, which is not the same as Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, disagrees. Those commentators, it says, “have somehow reasoned themselves into the notion that with ‘include,’ all the components must not be mentioned, which has never been the case.” Where do I stand on all this? I sum it up in my recent column.

Wretched retching

A while back, a character in a book I was reading got sick. As told in the story, “He wretched” long after his stomach was empty.

Oops. What the writer should have written — or, more  precisely, what the copy editor should have caught — was that wretched should have been retched.

The disheartening thing about this error is that it appeared almost 300 pages into an otherwise very well copy edited book.

Whoever was copy editing this book knew what they were doing. Yet even a team of professional editors with great skills aren’t immune to letting typos slip by. That’s troubling because it means that, no matter how hard you try to make a written work perfect, there are no guarantees.

Plus, some typos are particularly easy to make.  Wretch and retch are among them.

According to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, a wretch is a person. Specifically:

1 : a miserable person : one who is profoundly unhappy or in great misfortune

2 : a base, despicable, or vile person

It’s one of those words you hear a lot in old-timey dialogue, especially British. For example, in Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist, a character refers to juries as “vulgar grovelling wretches.” And of course, the term “poor wretch” comes up in pretty much every piece of fiction with a Dickensian tone.

From wretch, comes the adjective wretched. But it’s not pronounced like the verb retched. Wretched has two syllables, RETCH-id. And it means:

1. deeply afflicted, dejected, or distressed in body or mind

2. extremely or deplorably bad or distressing <was in wretched health> <a wretched accident>

3.  being or appearing mean, miserable, or contemptible <dressed in wretched old clothes>

The verb retch is simpler.  It means only 1. to vomit, 2. to make an effort to vomit.

There’s no trick to keeping them straight, other than just being on your guard. Which, somewhere around page 300 in a 900-page novel, is no small feat.