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  | Dangling Modifiers CORRECT DANGLING MODIFIERS Modifiers must point clearly to the words they describe. Otherwise, sentences may seem illogical. This happens if you forget to mention the word a modifier is supposed to describe. In such cases, the modifier is said to "dangle"; it has nothing to hang on to. Say you wrote Dangling: Walking across the field, the river came into view. Your reader would surely know that you—not the river—were walking. But that's not what the sentence says. To correct dangling modifiers, add the word(s) you forgot. To do so, however, you might have to rewrite the sentence. Revised: Walking across the field, I saw the river. Now, Walking across the field clearly points to the pronoun I. Working with It Is and It Was Constructions You might create a dangling modifier if you follow a modifier with a main clause whose subject is it and whose verb is was or another form of to be. Dangling: Concerned about the rain, it was decided that the picnic should be canceled. [Concerned about the rain has nothing to modify except the word it, which refers to no word in the sentence.] Revised:Concerned about the rain, our club decided to call off the picnic. [Now, Concerned about the rain clearly refers to club, a subject the reader can identify.] |
