Back to Okslen Acupuncture P.C. v Dinallo, 2009 NY Slip Op 31924(U) (Sup Ct, NY County, 2009), only because I know Zuppa loves it. But this time, there won’t be any discussion of the case, its merits, or anything remotely relevant. Instead, let’s talk about locution. On page 12, in footnote 4, the Court writes:
The split infinitive is set forth in Petitioner’s petition, and is not in this Court’s locution.
The Court is referring to the phrase, “To thoroughly audit.” Why isn’t it in the Court’s locution? It could be because the Court just plain hates split infinitives. Maybe the Court has never heard of the phrase–unlikely, but possible.. Or, it could be because one of the definitions of audit is, “a methodical examination and review.” In other words, to say “to thoroughly audit” is almost the same as saying “to thoroughly thoroughly” audit. Unfortunately, all audits are not methodical–someone can half-ass an audit. And where someone (or an organization) has half-assed an audit in a past, directing them “to thoroughly audit” can make sense.
If the Court does in fact hate split infinitives, the question is why? Are they bad per se? With that in mind, I put the question to the twitterverse. I received an answer from Roy Mura:
@nofaultparadise @GrammarGirl, the maven of morphology, says no. http://bit.ly/zarQg
And there you have it. It’s perfectly reasonable to split those infinitives.
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I’ve always said that I write like a lobotomized Hemingway, so don’t think that I am pretending to have the writing skillz.