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The Gist of Ending Sentences with Prepositions

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The Gist of Ending Sentences with Prepositions

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Probably one of the most famous quotes pertaining to this particular facet of grammar is that of Winston Churchill:

"This is the sort of English up with which I will not put."

He has a point. The notion that no English sentence should end with a preposition is unrealistic and somewhat pedantic. It stems from a silly assumption that English should mirror Latin, even though English was influenced by other languages and language structures. Still, stricter professors, employers and revisors may insist upon not ending sentences with prepositions. In those cases, rewrite sentences to avoid this. In other cases (including formal writing), here are a few quick guidelines on the subject.

Often times (more orally than in written form) people will end sentences with prepositions that are completely arbitrary and unnecessary. This should always be avoided in both formal and informal writing.

We were confused about where he was at.

Revised: We were confused about where he was.

You should also not end a sentence with a preposition when it could be left out without the sentence losing any meaning. For example:

Phrasal verbs are verbs that made up of multiple words, one of which is always a preposition. Nothing is wrong with sentences that end with prepositions that are part of a phrasal verb.

He tried to cheer her up.

They need to calm down.

My name was left out.

When faced with this type of sentence in a situation that does not allow you to rightly end a sentence with a preposition, rewrite the sentence to avoid using the phrasal verb.

Revised: He tried to improve her mood.

Revised: They need to relax.

Revised: My name was not included.

Again, nothing is wrong with these sentences, but that is not to say that you won't be forced to rearrange them to avoid a preposition at the end of a sentence. When possible, try to rearrange the sentence in a way that avoids awkward wording.

Rewrite the following sentences to avoid endings with prepositions.

1. What did he step on?

Sample answer

2. I think that he wants to come with.

Sample answer

3. You'll have to go around.

Sample answer

4. This is the book I told you about.

Sample answer

5. Jill was sitting on the couch that Jeff was sweeping under.

Sample answer

6. Where are you off to?

Sample answer

7. It was the worst natural disaster that she had ever heard of.

Sample answer

8. Our response will depend on what you ask for.

Sample answer

9. He's hard to talk to.

Sample answer

10. What does the recipe consist of?

Sample answer

Einsohn, Amy. The Copyeditor's Handbook: A Guide for Book Publishing and Corporate Communications. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2006.

Flick, Jane and Celia Millward. Handbook for Writers. 3rd Canadian ed. Toronto: Harcourt Brace & Company, Ltd., 1999.

Messenger, William E. et al. The Canadian Writer's Handbook. 5th ed. Toronto: Oxford University Press Canada, 2008.

The Chicago Manual of Style. 15th ed. rev. and expanded. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010.

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Tips and Tricks - Ending Sentences with Prepositions

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LinguisTech est un site Web de référence pour les langagiers qui comprend une boîte à outils de technologies langagières, un centre de documentation et de formation ainsi qu'une communauté virtuelle. LinguisTech is a reference Web site for language professionals. It consists of a language technologies tool box, a training and documentation centre and a virtual community.

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Is ending a sentence with a preposition a recipe for bad grammar? If you must prepare letters, reports, proposals, or other written materials on a daily basis, it's a good idea to have a firm grasp of the essential rules of English grammar. However, the topic of ending a sentence with a preposition is one that continues to inspire debate even among those who are committed to promoting good writing.

What Is a Preposition?

Before discussing whether or not it's acceptable to end a sentence with a preposition, it's helpful to clarify what this term actually means. Essentially, a preposition is a word that is used to create a relationship between other words. In many cases, prepositions deal with concepts relating to location and time, such as "under," "around," or "after." You'll also encounter multi-word prepositions that serve the same kind of purpose, like "along with," "on top of," and "except for."

Download YourDictionary's list of common preposition words and phrases within the English language to help you remember them.

View & Download PDF

Is Ending a Sentence with a Preposition Acceptable?

At one time, schoolchildren were taught that a sentence should never end with a preposition. However, this is a rule from Latin grammar that was applied to English. While many aspects of Latin have made their way into the English language, this particular grammar rule is not suited for modern English usage.

There are times when trying to avoid ending a sentence with a preposition creates unnecessary and awkward phrasing.

Winston Churchill once allegedly exclaimed, "That is the sort of thing up with which I will not put!" to mock someone who criticized him for ending a sentence with a preposition.

"Who is he going to the movies with?" is much more natural and casual than "With whom is he going to the movies?"

Similarly, "Where are you coming from?" is much less formal than rearranging the sentence to avoid ending in a preposition: "From where are you coming?"

Since the purpose of writing is to clearly communicate your thoughts and ideas, it's perfectly acceptable to end a sentence with a preposition if the alternative would create confusion or sound unnatural.

Clear and Communicative

However, it may still be worth revising your sentences to avoid ending them with a preposition whenever possible if you wish to reduce the risk of controversy.

Since there are still a number of people who believe ending a sentence with a preposition is incorrect, considering your audience's thoughts on the issue is a wise idea-particularly when you're trying to gain a new client or land an important job interview. For example, "Which department is she in?" could simply be rewritten to read as "She is in which department?" without influencing clarity or comprehension.

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Is ending a sentence with a preposition a recipe for bad grammar? If you must prepare letters, reports, proposals, or other written materials on a daily basis, it's a good idea to have a firm grasp of the essential rules of English grammar.

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Ending Sentences with Prepositions

One of our subscribers wrote to ask about ending sentences with prepositions. She offered several examples of what she considered incorrect usage:

1. Where is my wallet at?

2. What do you need to go to the store for?

3. Which department is he in?

All three of these sentences could be revised to avoid ending them with prepositions. Technically, however, only the first sentence is ungrammatical because the preposition in that sentence has no object.

Take a look at those same three sentences phrased another way:

1. My wallet is where?

2. You do need to go to the store for what?

3. He is in which department?

Notice that in the first sentence, we had to drop the at in order for the sentence to be grammatically correct. We could not have written "My wallet is at where" because where is an adverb; it cannot be the object of the preposition at because objects must be nouns or pronouns. But in the other two sentences, the prepositions for and in fit grammatically in their sentences because they do have objects. That is, they launch the prepositional phrases "for what" and "in which department."

Although sentences 2 and 3 are not ungrammatical, we could, of course, rewrite them to avoid ending them with prepositions:

1. For what do you need to go to the store?

2. In which department is he?

Such wording sounds very formal, however, and would sound pretentious in casual conversation and in most professional writing. Nonetheless, in professional contexts, it is probably best to avoid ending sentences with prepositions simply because many people *think* that doing so is always incorrect. Many readers do not recognize the difference between ending a sentence with a preposition whose object appears earlier in the sentence and ending a sentence with a preposition that has no object.

On the subject of ending sentences with prepositions, people often recount a story involving Winston Churchill. When an editor dared to change a sentence of Churchill's that appeared to end inappropriately with a preposition, Churchill responded by writing to the editor, "This is the kind of impertinence up with which I shall not put." His purpose, of course, was to illustrate the awkwardness that can result from rigid adherence to the notion that prepositions at the end of sentences are always incorrect.

The same words that frequently function as prepositions can also function as adverbs, and often they exist as part of what we call a phrasal verb. Verbs that contain adverbs-also known as particles- are easy to spot because the adverb significantly affects the meaning of the verb. In Churchill's sentence, for example, the verb "to put up with" means "to tolerate" and is a very different verb from "to put," which means "to set" or "to place."

Here are a few other examples. Notice how the verbs change in meaning when the adverb is part of the phrasal verb:

"to get" vs. "to get up" and "get by"

"to look" vs. "to look up," "to look out," and "to look over"

"to break" vs. "to break down" and "to break in"

"to check" vs. "to check out" and "to check up on"

"to run" vs. "to run over" and "to run down"

"to shake" vs. "to shake up" and "to shake down"

"to blow" vs. "to blow up," "to blow over," "to blow out," "to blow off," and "to blow away"

Sentences that end with these phrasal verbs appear to end with prepositions, but in fact they do not.

As long as we continue to have faith, we will get by.

This morning I have four proposals to look over.

Alice is constantly afraid that her car will break down.

Ten minutes after the timer is set, the device will blow up.

TEST YOURSELF

Do any of the following sentences improperly end in a preposition?

1. Where is he at?

2. When you buy your new dictionary, what words are you going to look up?

3. Which employees are you attending the conference with?

4. Who did you give the flowers to?

ANSWERS

1. Drop the "at" because it is not an adverb and, as a preposition, it has no object. Correction: "Where is he?"

2. Correct. The preposition "up" is a part of the phrasal verb "to look up."

3. Correct. Although this wording is informal, the preposition with does have an object: employees. The more formal wording-and the wording more appropriate in writing-would be "With which employees are you attending the conference?"

4. This sentence is highly informal not only because it separates the preposition to from its object but also because it incorrectly uses who when it should use whom. Only diehard grammarians would take issue with this usage in casual conversation. In professional documents, however, we should write "To whom did you give the flowers?" (For more information, read our post on .)

Copyright 2003 Get It Write. Revised 2018.

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Ending Sentences with Prepositions | Get It Write Online

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One of our subscribers wrote to ask about ending sentences with prepositions. She offered several examples of what she considered incorrect usage: Where is my wallet at? What do you need to go to the store for? Which department is he in? All three of these sentences could be revised to avoid ending them with prepositions.

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Although prepositions are small words, they are very important ones. In this lesson, we will explain some common mistakes in the use of prepositions.

Incorrect: Although he is clever, he lacks of experience.

Correct: Although he is clever, he lacks experience.

Incorrect: The train is now approaching to Boston.

Correct: The train is now approaching Boston.

Incorrect: We were not allowed to enter into the house.

Correct: We were not allowed to enter the house.
Explanations
The verbs lack, approach and enter are directly followed by objects without prepositions. Other verbs that do not normally take prepositions are: discuss, marry and resemble.

Incorrect: See you on next Friday.

Correct: See you next Friday.

Incorrect: I will never forget meeting her on that afternoon.

Correct: I will never forget meeting her that afternoon.
Explanation
Prepositions are not used before a number of common time expressions beginning next, last, this, one etc.

Incorrect: Of what color are her eyes?

Correct: What color are her eyes?

Incorrect: He is of just the right height to be a good soldier.

Correct: He is j ust the right height to be a good soldier.
Explanation
Expressions containing words like height, weight, length, size, color, age etc., are usually connected to the subject by the verb be without a preposition.

Incorrect: I am going to home.

Correct: I am going home.
Explanation
We do not use to before home.

Incorrect: To where shall I send it?

Correct: Where shall I send it to?
Explanation
The structures where ...to?, what...like? and what...for? have a fixed word order. It is not possible to move the preposition to the beginning of the clause.

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Common mistakes in the use of prepositions

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Although prepositions are small words, they are very important ones. In this lesson, we will explain some common mistakes in the use of prepositions. Incorrect: Although he is clever, he lacks of experience. Correct: Although he is clever, he lacks experience. Incorrect: The train is now approaching to Boston.

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Trenton Nalls

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Ending a Sentence with a Preposition: It's Ok and It's Not | Grammarly

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Grammar snobs love to tell anyone who will listen: You should NEVER end a sentence with a preposition! Luckily for those poor, persecuted prepositions, that just isn't true. Here are a few preposition guidelines:

Don't end a sentence with a preposition

1 In formal writing

It's not an error to end a sentence with a preposition, but it is a little less formal. In emails, text messages, and notes to friends, it's perfectly fine. But if you're writing a research paper or submitting a business proposal and you want to sound very formal, avoid ending sentences with prepositions.

2 If something is missing

The preposition atop is missing an object all together. Let's try that again:

It's ok to end a sentence with a preposition

1 In informal writing or conversation

Unless you're a time traveler from another era, you'll probably use the second sentence when speaking. Informal language is generally accepted in conversation and will likely allow your conversation to flow more smoothly since your friends won't be distracted by your perfectly precise sentence construction.

2 If the preposition is part of an informal phrase

Also correct:

Both 'put up with' and 'hard to come by' are commonly accepted informal phrases, and it's OK to end sentences with them. Note, however, that you should avoid these phrases in formal writing.

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You've been lied to. Here's why you absolutely can end a sentence with a preposition.

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Grammar snobs love to tell anyone who will listen: You should NEVER end a sentence with a preposition! Luckily for those poor, persecuted prepositions, that just isn't true. Here are a few preposition guidelines: It's not an error to end a sentence with a preposition, but it is a little less formal.

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Abbey Walker

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- [Voiceover] Hello grammarians. Today, I wanna talk about ending sentences with prepositions, and I wanna tell you, straight up, it is totally okay. Like, it is perfectly grammatically correct and sensible and fine to end sentences with prepositions in English. And if you don't know what I mean, that's fine. Let me throw out some examples. "It's a crazy world we live in," for example, is a sentence that ends in "in," which is a preposition. And for years, for hundreds of years, there have been people, language authorities that have been telling you it's not okay to end a sentence with a preposition. Let me tell you, by the power vested in me, it is totally okay. This is one of those language superstitions that will not die. Taking away the terminal preposition takes away sentences like, "That's not behavior I'll put up with." And, in fact, some of you have maybe heard the statement that is supposedly attributed to Winston Churchill where he says, "That is something with which up I will not put," which kinda emphasizes how clunky that is, you know? If that's supposed to be formal high language, it sounds really inarticulate. Not a fan. This is ultimately a question not of grammar but of style because there's nothing about "It's a crazy world we live in," that doesn't make sense that doesn't function as a sentence. Indeed, there's nothing grammatically incorrect with, "This is behavior with which up I will not put," it's just needlessly verbose and twisting back on itself for the sake of avoiding something that doesn't need to be avoided. And we can trace all of this back to Robert Lowth, a man who was the Bishop of London during part of the 18th century, and he wrote about terminal prepositions in his 1762 "Short Introduction to English Grammar," which reads in part, "This is an idiom "which our language is strongly inclined to; "it prevails in common conversation "and suits very well with the familiar style in writing; "but the placing of the preposition "before the relative is more graceful, "and agrees much better with the solemn and elevated style." But, Bishop Lowth, may I direct your attention to this part of your statement? "This is an idiom which our language "is strongly inclined to." Even when Bishop Lowth is using what he calls this solemn and elevated style, he himself can not avoid ending a clause, boom, with a preposition. Game, set, match, sir. The question is, why did Lowth have such a bee in his bonnet about prepositions at the end of sentences? And the answer can be found in Latin. Follow me over to the next screen. Here is the deal with Latin. In Latin, prepositions have a very particular function, similar to how they work in English. But let's break apart what the word preposition is. In Latin, the word "preposition" comes from "prae positio," which means "placed before," right here, placed before, because here's something cool about Latin: Latin's word order rules are different than English's word order rules. I'll explain. You know, in English, we have this expression, "To put the cart before the horse," which means to embark on a project before you're really ready. And this is a very ancient expression, in fact, one that can be attested in Latin like so. "Ante equum carrum ponere," right? Okay, so this is, "Before the horse, the cart to put." Here's the thing about prepositions in Latin is that in Latin, this, "ante," before, always has to be positioned before the word it's attached to, so before the horse. But in Latin, you can rearrange this sentence any way you like. So, you could say, "Carrum ponere ante equum." And just because of the way Latin works, because of its case endings and because of this prepositional relationship, we can always tell, no matter what order the words are in, how the sentence parts relate to one another. Or we could also switch it around: "Ponere carrum ante equum," right? It could in any order, as long as ante was before equum. Now, admittedly, in English, if you wanted to end this with a preposition, it would still sound pretty awkward, like, "The cart is the thing that the horse is before," but it is still grammatical. If you move this thing, if you move "ante" out of order, there's no way to tell what's going on in this sentence. Latin, during the time that Lowth was Bishop of London, was the language of scholarship, right? It was this language that enabled people all over the European continent to communicate with each other in a common language of knowledge. It was the language of religion and philosophy. And all of that added up to make Latin really cool, and also very powerful. And because of the history of the English language, which basically entails people in boats coming over the North Sea to beat the tar out of Celts and Anglo-Saxons and leave Latin- or Norse- or French-shaped dents in their language, English has this kind of uncomfortable relationship with Latin. English scholars kinda had an inferiority complex. And so, during the 17th and 18th century, you really see this move towards Latinizing English, trying to make English grammar behave more like Latin grammar. But English comes from a different language heritage; it's a Germanic language. And that doesn't mean it's better or worse than Latin, it just means it's different, and it behaves differently. We shouldn't try to treat English as though it were anything other than English. So, if anyone ever tells you that you can't end a sentence with a preposition, send them this page. Or if you prefer, you know where to send them to, which is here on Khan Academy, where you can learn anything. David out.

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Terminal prepositions (video) | Khan Academy

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Learn for free about math, art, computer programming, economics, physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, finance, history, and more. Khan Academy is a nonprofit with the mission of providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.

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Trenton Nalls

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Prepositions are relation words; they can indicate location, time, or other more abstract relationships. A preposition combines with another word (usually a noun or pronoun) called the complement. Prepositions are still in bold, and their complements are in italics:

Prepositions generally come before their complements (e.g., in England, under the table, of Elena). However, there are a small handful of exceptions, including notwithstanding and ago:

Financial limitations notwithstanding, Phil paid back his debts.

He was released three days ago.

Prepositions of location are pretty easily defined ( near, far, over, under, etc.), and prepositions about time are as well ( before, after, at, during, etc.). Prepositions of "more abstract relationships," however, are a little more nebulous in their definition. The video below gives a good overview of this category of prepositions:

Note: The video said that prepositions are a closed group, but it never actually explained what a closed group is. A closed group simply refers to a part of speech that doesn't allow in new words. While it's easy to invent new nouns (e.g., selfie, Google), you can't invent new words in a closed group.

So far, all of the prepositions we've looked at have been one word (and most of them have been one syllable). The most common prepositions are one-syllable words. According to one ranking, the most common English prepositions are on, in, to, by, for, with, at, of, from, as.

There are also some prepositions that have more than one word:

in spite of (She made it to work in spite of the terrible traffic.)

by means of (He traveled by means of boat.)

except for (Joan invited everyone to her party except for Ben.)

next to (Go ahead and sit down next to Jean-Claude.)

Practice

Identify the prepositions in the following sentences:

1. I love every painting by Vermeer except for The Girl with the Pearl Earring.

2. In spite of their fight, Beatriz wanted to know if she would still see Alexandre before lunch.

3. He only talks about two things: his band and his dogs.

Using Prepositions

A lot of struggles with prepositions come from trying to use the correct preposition. Some verbs require specific prepositions. Here's a table of some of the most commonly misused preposition/verb pairs:

Some verbs take a different preposition, depending on the object of the sentence:

When multiple objects take the same preposition, you don't need to repeat the preposition. For example, in the sentence "I'll read any book by J.K. Rowling or R. L. Stine," both J. K. Rowling and R. L. Stine are objects of the preposition by, so it only needs to appear once in the sentence. However, you can't do this when you have different prepositions. Let's look at this using a common phrase: "We fell out of the frying pan and into the fire." If you leave out one of the prepositions, as in "We fell out of the frying pan and the fire," the sentence is saying that we fell out of the frying pan and out of the fire, which would be preferable, but isn't the case in this idiom.

Prepositions in Sentences

You'll often hear about prepositional phrases. A prepositional phrase includes a preposition and its complement (e.g., " behind the house" or " a long time ago "). These phrases can appear at the beginning or end of sentences. When they appear at the beginning of a sentence, they typically need a comma afterwards:

You can drop that off behind the house.

A long time ago, dinosaurs roamed the earth.

As the saying goes, hard work always pays off.

Ending a Sentence with a Preposition

It is 100 percent okay to end a sentence with a preposition. The rule against doing so stems from Latin, which belongs to a completely different language family than English. Using a terminal preposition can often make your writing smoother and more concise. Winston Churchill is credited with saying "This is the sort of English up with which I will not put," when he was criticized for his use of terminal prepositions. (A more natural way to phrase Churchill's glib quote would be "This is the sort of English I will not put up with.")

However, it's still best to avoid using terminal prepositions unnecessarily. If your sentence ends with a preposition and would still mean the same thing without the preposition, take it out. For example:

Where are you at?

That's not what it's used for.

If you remove at, the sentence becomes "Where are you?" This means the same thing, so removing at is a good idea. However, if you remove for, the sentence becomes "That's not what it's used," which doesn't make sense.

Practice

Read each sentence and determine if the prepositions are being used correctly. If they are not, re-write the sentence.

1. Do you have any idea why Olivia keeps calling for?

2. You have no idea how much trouble you're in.

3. Luiz agreed with hand his credit card over to the cashier.

4. Last week Ngozi reconciled to the new prices and her new co-worker.

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Prepositions are relation words; they can indicate location, time, or other more abstract relationships. A preposition combines with another word (usually a noun or pronoun) called the complement. Prepositions are still in bold, and their complements are in italics: Prepositions generally come before their complements (e.g., in England, under the table, of Elena).

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Molly King

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Free practice questions for ACT English - Preposition Errors. Includes full solutions and score reporting.

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Preposition lesson and practice excercises

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Preposition lesson and practice excercises

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Molly King

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Ending with a Preposition | Grammar Quizzes

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Consider placement options for a preposition at the end of a sentence. Is it avoidable or unavoidable? What do grammarians have to say about it?

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Ending a Sentence with a Preposition: It's Ok and It's Not | Grammarly

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Grammar snobs love to tell anyone who will listen: You should NEVER end a sentence with a preposition! Luckily for those poor, persecuted prepositions, that just isn't true. Here are a few preposition guidelines:

Don't end a sentence with a preposition

1 In formal writing

It's not an error to end a sentence with a preposition, but it is a little less formal. In emails, text messages, and notes to friends, it's perfectly fine. But if you're writing a research paper or submitting a business proposal and you want to sound very formal, avoid ending sentences with prepositions.

2 If something is missing

The preposition atop is missing an object all together. Let's try that again:

It's ok to end a sentence with a preposition

1 In informal writing or conversation

Unless you're a time traveler from another era, you'll probably use the second sentence when speaking. Informal language is generally accepted in conversation and will likely allow your conversation to flow more smoothly since your friends won't be distracted by your perfectly precise sentence construction.

2 If the preposition is part of an informal phrase

Also correct:

Both 'put up with' and 'hard to come by' are commonly accepted informal phrases, and it's OK to end sentences with them. Note, however, that you should avoid these phrases in formal writing.

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You've been lied to. Here's why you absolutely can end a sentence with a preposition.

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Grammar snobs love to tell anyone who will listen: You should NEVER end a sentence with a preposition! Luckily for those poor, persecuted prepositions, that just isn't true. Here are a few preposition guidelines: It's not an error to end a sentence with a preposition, but it is a little less formal.

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How to Improve Your Writing: Eliminate Prepositions

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How to Improve Your Writing: Eliminate Prepositions

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Kylie Woolum

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As we continue our series on reducing wordiness and improving your writing, we will shift our focus to the dreadful prepositions that plague everyone! For many of you reading our posts, English is a second language, and we can imagine how much you despise memorizing prepositional phrases. Well, we've got a bit of good news for you! One of the best ways to reduce word count and tighten your sentences is ELIMINATING prepositions. Yup, that's right. You can skip these horrid parts of speech and save yourself the headache of trying to figure out if the right phrase includes "on" or "of!"

Tip # 2: Eliminating Prepositional Phrases

Let's look at the following examples:

1. The blood pressure of the mice was elevated.

2. The elephant teetered along the edge of the cliff.

3. The focus of this project was to study the effects of increased global temperatures on local fish hatcheries.

What's wrong with the above sentences? Grammatically, they're correct. But they're super wordy, aren't they? In each phrase, we can eliminate prepositions to shorten them.

1. The blood pressure of the mice was elevated. [8 words]

2. The elephant teetered along the edge of the cliff. [9 words]

3. The focus of this project was to study the effects of increased global temperatures on local fish hatcheries. [19 words]

Above, we highlighted the prepositions we can delete in red.

1. The mice's blood pressure was elevated. [6 words]

2. The elephant teetered along the cliff's edge. [7 words]

3. This project examined how increased global temperatures affect local fish hatcheries. [11 words]

As in the examples above, you could shorten your word count by two words for each prepositional phrase you eliminate. Imagine a page filled with prepositional phrases like the ones above. That's a lot of words you could delete!

There are many scenarios in which prepositions can be omitted. You saw a few of these cases above. Another situation is one you learned recently in our article on eliminating nominalizations. If you may recall, nominalizations often create passive voice structures!

For those of you wanting to learn how to avoid or replace prepositional phrases, the following is a list of common situations in which you should revise prepositional phrases and how you can do so.

1. Be possessive: In many situations where there is a close connection, like a possessive relationship between two nouns, you can eliminate the preposition. For example, if you have "Noun1 of Noun 2," or "Location1 in Location2," take the second noun and move it before the first noun and add an apostrophe to create a possessive form for the second noun.

The approval of the Food and Drug Administration was received yesterday. → The Food and Drug Administration's approval was received yesterday.

The studies were conducted at Max Laboratories in Chicago. → The studies were conducted at Chicago's Max Laboratories.

2. Be active: When a passive construction is followed by "by" (Noun1 was/were + past participle + by + Noun2), take the second noun and make it the subject of a sentence using active voice.
The approval of the plan was given by the committee. → The committee approved the plan yesterday.

3. Choose adverb substitutes: Some prepositional phrases, like those starting with "with," can be converted to stronger adverbs.

The seller agreed with reluctance. → The seller reluctantly agreed.

He spoke with hesitation when he accepted the deal. → He spoke hesitantly as he accepted the deal.

By chance, I finished work on time. → Fortuitously, I finished work on time.

4. Replace with stronger verbs: Some prepositional phrases can simply be replaced with strong verbs. Watch for phrases using the verbs "get" and "make."

He got to the finish line. → He reached the finish line.

Increased benefits can make up for long working hours. → Increased benefits can offset long working hours.

5. Avoid nominalizations (see the separate article we wrote on this topic. Click here for "Eliminating Nominalizations)

6. Was it really necessary? Some prepositional phrases can be deleted because they add no value to the sentence, given the context.
In our current situation, we should decline the offer. → We should decline the offer.

7. Embrace the wh-clauses: With verbs dealing with "saying" (ask, say, admit, argue, reply, agree, mention, explain, suggest, etc.) or mental activities like thinking, studying, and deciding (e.g., know, understand, suppose, remember, forget, wonder, study, examine, decide, etc.), use the wh-question words to build strong, succinct clauses.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of solar radiation on bioluminescence. → This study examined how solar radiation affects bioluminescence.

Our mission was to conduct an investigation into the relationship between sunlight and plant growth. → We investigated how sunlight affects plant growth.

Now, let's try a few exercises!

1. The house of my mother sat on a big hill.

2. The licensing of the software will be completed next week.

3. The variables changed with little difference.

4. The aim of our research was to assess the correlation between variable A and DNA replication rates.

5. This paper was written to explore the way in which extra recess time and the test performance of students are related.

6. To get back to you, we are looking back on what was done to figure out what we can do moving forward. [This one's hard. How short can you make this one?]

Answer key:

1. My mother's house sat on a big hill.

2. The software licensing will be completed next week.

3. The variables hardly changed.

4. Our research aimed to assess how variable A affects DNA replication rates.

5. This paper explores how extra recess time affects students' test performance.

6. We are examining the past to determine how we should proceed.

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How to Improve Your Writing: Eliminate Prepositions | Wordvice

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As we continue our series on reducing wordiness and improving your writing, we will shift our focus to the dreadful prepositions that plague everyone! For many of you reading our posts, English is a second language, and we can imagine how much you despise memorizing prepositional phrases.