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| Flip sides of Grecian coin |
There are three notable kinds of sentences.
- Balanced
- Periodic
- Loose
Periodic and loose sentences are flip sides of the same coin. In this post we'll take a look at loose sentences.
The structure of a loose sentence is complete at at least one point before its end.
A main clause is followed by one or more subordinate clauses or modifying phrases, and the reader may stop before the end of the sentence (/) and still make sense of it, though the full meaning, of course, won't be completely understood without reading to the end.
Example: A ghastly grin
wrinkled his lips / as he gazed on me, where I sat fulfilling the task
which he had allotted to me.
The advantage of the loose sentence is that it requires little mental energy. Charles Swain Thomas writes that the reader
...does not need to hold in mind, at one time, all the parts of the sentence in order to get the main idea; hence he is relieved from the strain of the periodic structure. Again, the plan of the loose sentence, like conversation, is informal, and is happily adapted to all kinds of informal discourse.
The disadvantage of the loose sentence is that it invites rambling. Says Thomas,
With these advantages, however, comes one temptation in the use of the loose sentence; namely, the introduction into the sentence, after it is complete, of ideas which are irrelevant to the main idea. Unless the writer keeps well in mind the real point which he wishes to make, his loose sentence will become slipshod and slovenly, and will express more than one thought.
 
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