Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog: The Quirky History and Lost Art of Diagramming Sentences [Paperback]

Kitty Burns Florey (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 5, 2007 | ISBN-10: 0156034433 | ISBN-13: 978-0156034432 | Edition: Reprint

In its heyday, sentence diagramming was wildly popular in grammar schools across the country. Kitty Burns Florey learned the method in sixth grade from Sister Bernadette: "It was a bit like art, a bit like mathematics. It was a picture of language. I was hooked." Now, in this offbeat history, Florey explores the sentence-diagramming phenomenon, including its humble roots at the Brooklyn Polytechnic, its "balloon diagram" predecessor, and what diagrams of famous writers’ sentences reveal about them. Along the way Florey offers up her own commonsense approach to learning and using good grammar. Charming, fun, and instructive, Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog will be treasured by all kinds of readers, from grumpy grammarians and crossword-puzzle aficionados to students of literature and lovers of language.

Editorial Reviews

Review

PRAISE FOR SISTER BERNADETTE’S BARKING DOG

"Florey writes with verve about the nuns who taught her to render the English language as a mess of slanted lines, explains how diagrams work, and traces the bizarre history of the men who invented this odd pedagogical tool . . . It’s a great read."--Slate

 

"This gem from copyeditor Florey is a bracing ode to grammar: it’s laced with a survivor’s nostalgia for classrooms ruled by knuckle-cracking nuns who knew their participles."—People

About the Author

KITTY BURNS FLOREY, a veteran copyeditor, is the author of nine novels and many short stories and essays. A longtime Brooklyn resident, she now divides her time between central Connecticut and upstate New York with her husband, Ron Savage.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 176 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; Reprint edition (November 5, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0156034433
• ISBN-13: 978-0156034432
• Product Dimensions: 7.1 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (51 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #524,284 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kitty Burns Florey (www.kittyburnsflorey.com) is the author of Script and Scribble: The Rise and Fall of Handwriting and Sister Bernadette's Barking Dog: The Quirky History and Lost Art of Diagramming Sentences. She is also the author of ten works of fiction, most recently The Writing Master, a historical novel set in Connecticut in 1856. A veteran copy editor, she has written many short stories and essays. Her New York Times blog on the writing process can be found here:
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/26/a-picture-of-language/?ref=opinion

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

91 of 94 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I loved this book! October 30, 2006

By T. MacCombie

Format:Hardcover

Who would have thought one could write such a funny, and charming, and informative book on sentence diagramming? Kitty Florey weaves her own 6th grade experiences diagramming sentences under the watchful eye of Sister Bernadette, and then reflects on other writers, notably Gertrude Stein, who was passionate about grammar, and even loved diagramming, (who knew?) but then wrote sentences that obeyed her OWN rules and defied grammatical conventions. Florey's tone, throughout this delightful book, is one of spontaneous humor and warmth. She is passionate about language herself, and seeing how language has evolved, with or without the help of diagramming, is a fascinating look at ourselves, our culture, and gives us a clue about what the future may hold for the written and spoken word.

81 of 88 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Barking for Bernadette October 27, 2006

By Michelle Bisson

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This book is a fabulous read: it is brilliant, erudite, easy-to-read, and laugh-out-loud funny. It will teach you all you never even thought to ask about diagramming sentences, but it is about far more than that. Really, it's an exploration of the evolution of the English language, the gap between those of us who MUST speak and write properly and those who say--whatever. Mostly, it'll make you laugh out loud and how many authors can do that? Move over, Lynn Truss and David Sedaris.

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars ok, needs some basics of diagramming December 29, 2007

By T. Burket VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

This short book is a pleasant memoir of a time when many people learned sentence diagramming and, to be honest, more of the rigors of grammar. In the author's case, she clearly recalls teacher Sister Bernadette and the pleasure diagramming brought both of them. I put this on my list after an interview with Ms. Florey refreshed my own fond memories of something logical and detailed that appealed to me as a future engineer who likes to write.

We learn some about the history of diagramming and its predecessors, with a mix of specific examples largely taken from literature. The literary references (Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jack Kerouac, etc.) allow her to tell various stories about the famous authors and shift into various riffs on English in general, such as "ain't". Those musings are interesting enough and move right along, but the net result is that I learned very little from the book.

I really wanted a modest refresher of diagramming basics in this book. Maybe 5-10 pages would have done the trick. There certainly was room. I studied the examples, thinking about how I would have done them myself or why they were done this way or that (e.g., oh, yes, that's a participle, isn't it, so it's written in that arc). For that reason, I will disagree slightly with Ms. Florey's statement that you don't learn grammar from diagramming. Perhaps diagramming forces you to think about what parts of speech those funky phrases are. The author credits Gene Moutoux for the complex diagrams, and his web site indeed has a nice introductory tutorial.

She gets full credit for pointing out weaknesses in diagramming, most notably that bad English and bad grammar often diagram just as well as the good stuff.

Even as someone who is no fan of George W. Bush, I can do without cracks about him in this type of book. The little dig against "Eats, Shoots & Leaves" fits better.

3.5 stars, rounded down