You ought to be able to show that you can do it a good deal better than anyone else with the regular tools before you have a license to bring in your own improvements. Ernest Hemingway One has to dismount from an idea, and get into the saddle again, at every parenthesis. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. Punctuation marks are the road signs placed along the highways of our communication to control speeds, provide directions, and prevent head-on collisions. Ever since then, I ve made a point of starting out with a parenthesis in the first sentence.
Many writers profess great exactness of punctuation, who never yet made a point.
The commas are the most useful and usable of all the stops. It is highly important to put them in place as you go along. Better to use them sparingly, and with affection, precisely when the need for each one arises, nicely, by itself. It is almost always a greater pleasure to come across a semicolon than a period. Lewis Thomas Exclamation points are the most irritating of all.