Kid Rock's wedding ring is flashier and has more diamonds than Pamela Anderson.
This sentence contains a faulty comparison. Kid Rock's wedding ring is compared to Pamela. A ring should be compared to another ring. One way to correct this error is to make "Pamela Anderson" possessive. The noun "wedding ring" would be implied and the comparison would be logical.
Kid Rock's wedding ring is flashier and has more diamonds than Pamela Anderson's.
2 Comments
Isn't it possible that the writer INTENDED to compare the ring to Pamela Anderson? The writer might be saying that Pamela Anderson is flashy and has lots of diamonds, and drawing a somewhat humorous comparison between the woman and the ring (humorous specifically BECAUSE a comparison between an object and a person is unusual). If that's the intent, then isn't the writer actually comparing two things that ARE similar (in that they're both flashy and both have diamonds), and therefore making a logical (if humorously intended) comparison? Or would that be a case where a rule is still being broken, but there can be debate over whether the break "worked" and might be "worth it," in the same way that judicious use of sentence fragments is sometimes considered to "work," even though it's technically incorrect? Just wondering — thanks! I love this site.
Great point!
Breaking rules with stylistic intent is perfectly fine in the proper context. Figurative writing often depends on expanding the boundaries of logic.
Just remember that the only way such a sentence would be featured on a standardized examination without being considered "incorrect" would be in a reading comprehension question testing knowledge of figurative language.
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