Booher's Rules of Business Grammar - Dianna Booher 2009
To balance or not to balance—that is the question
Parallel bars and balance beams
Clothing consultants charge big bucks to help clients update their current wardrobes with the season’s newest fashions—shoes with handbags, jewelry with dresses and pantsuits, ties with suits. Interior designers do the same thing in helping families select home furnishings—matching lamps on end tables, matching photo frames, coordinating wallpaper and draperies. It should be no surprise, then, that items have to “match” in a grammatically correct sentence.
Parallelism is the grammatical term given to that matching concept.
43. To balance or not to balance—that is the question
PARALLELISM PERFECTED
Great orators and philosophers through the centuries have put the power of parallelism to use in these classic lines:
“A government of the people, by the people, for the people.”
“To be or not to be—that is the question.”
“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”
“If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.”
“Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.”
“It’s not what you know; it’s who you know.”
“Fish or cut bait.”
Well, okay, maybe not all of these are classics, but you get my drift.
Equal ideas have to match or balance in the way you express them. That is, they all should be verbs, nouns, complete sentences, only phrases, and so forth.
Equal ideas deserve similar structure and expression.
Incorrect:
You can either pay now or you can pay later. (Pay now and pay later are the equivalent ideas that need to balance. So the either/or should link them together in exactly the same way.)
Correct:
You can either pay now or pay later.
Incorrect:
He doesn’t know whether renting more office space or to try to hire a virtual sales team would be the better approach. (Renting more office space and trying to hire a virtual sales team are the equivalent ideas that need to balance. So the whether/or should link them together in matching expressions.)
Correct:
He doesn’t know whether renting more office space or trying to hire a virtual sales team would be the better approach.
Memory tip
Para … llel sounds like pair. A pair of ideas should be expressed (or dressed) as twins.