The semicolon

There’s really no need for me to make a lengthy post about the semicolon; The Guardian has done it for me.

I can, at least, single out the paragraph that actually explains how to use it:

How, though, are you supposed to use the thing? According to the eminently readable rules of French grammar, the semicolon has several specific applications. First, it allows a writer to introduce a logical balance into a long phrase. Second, it can serve to divide two phrases that are in themselves independent, but whose significance is in some way linked (viz: “The semicolon is necessary; I have just proved it,” or, as Michel Houellebecq, one of the very few contemporary French writers to use the point-virgule, would have it: “He was unable to remember his last erection; he was waiting for the storm.”) It can also, more prosaically, be used to separate the various elements of an enumeration or list (or indeed to separate groups of similar elements linked by commas within a longer list). Finally, a semicolon can replace a comma when “the use of the latter might prove confusing”.

These may be the rules of French grammar, but they also apply in English. Here are some examples of usage:

To link two related phrases:

• He always carried an umbrella; he was known as the ‘Umbrella Fella’.
• I never wrote to her again; her letters to me remained on the sideboard, unopened.

For items in a list (particularly where the individual items themselves contain commas):

• In my apartment I had a pair of shoes, blue; a letter from my cousin, who never wrote anymore; and a small, bad-tempered bird that sang Wagner while I read.
• I found these sausages in Paris, France; London, England; Rome, Italy; and Berlin, Germany.

To replace a comma, in order to indicate a stronger subdivision:

• I placed the bucket, now full of water, directly above the open door to the bedroom; and Jane, who hadn’t suspected a thing, soon found herself soaking wet.
• He came to the end of the house, which lay back from the road, and saw her at the end of the path; but instead of continuing towards her, he hid till she had gone. (This last example is taken from New Hart’s Rules, published by the OUP.)

In the end, it comes down to personal style. The last two examples could equally have been broken up into two sentences, by omitting the conjunction and replacing the semicolon with a full stop. However, this would alter the rhythm of the words. The semicolon shouldn’t be abandoned altogether; neither should it be overused. Play with it, see what it does to the flow of the text, and make use of it when it produces the desired effect.