Doctor's notes

In UK style, you should never encounter an ‘yze’ ending; for example, ‘analyse’, ‘paralyse’ and ‘electrolyse’ are UK spelling, no matter whether ‘ise’ or ‘ize’ endings are being used. In US style, these words would attract a ‘z’, so ‘analyze’, ‘paralyze’ and ‘electrolyze’.

See Butcher’s Copy-editing, section 6.14, for more examples. It also gives a useful list of words, such as ‘comprise’, that should always be spelt with an ‘ise’ ending regardless of overall ending style.

These are language and grammar ‘issues’ that some less experienced editors dutifully correct, but that are perfectly acceptable in English.

• ‘And’ or ‘but’ at the beginning of a sentence.
• Prepositions (e.g. ‘to’, ‘of’, ‘at’, ‘by’, ‘with’) at the end of a sentence.
• Split infinitives (e.g. ‘to do’, ‘to be’) – ‘to boldly go’, ‘to happily edit’.
• Referring to ‘data’ in the singular – ‘data is’, ‘data has’.

For more zombie rules that refuse to die, see the CIEP’s free fact sheet.