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Oksana Owens

Professor Cowart

Standard English Grammar

26 February 2020

YLOO

The beautiful thing about language is that there are so many ways that we can mix it up

and shift things around. A word can have one sole meaning, or it can have several different

definitions and methods of use. Some words and phrases can have completely different meanings

in different languages or cultures. The possibilities are seemingly endless—especially when it

comes to the American language. Today I want to talk about one versatile word in particular—

let’s explore the four-letter word only.

After consulting the lengthy pages of The Oxford English Dictionary, I came to find out

that this word has a long history of how it came to be its present form, “only.” It’s beginning

usage dates back all the way to 1000 in the forms of “ánlic” and “ænlic.” Its truly fascinating just

how long ago we began using many different forms of the words and languages that we use

today. This word can be used as an adverb, conjunction or an adjective which makes it very

useful and versatile. It’s a word we use only every day.

The Webster’s New World College Dictionary in the fifth edition does a great job of

defining and giving examples for all of the forms of this word. This dictionary defines “only” in

its adjectival form as, “alone of its or their kind; by itself or themselves; having no siblings; or

being alone in its or their superiority.” It describes it in its adverbial form as, “and no other; and
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no (or nothing) more; in what follows in the end; and as recently as.” In its conjunctional form it

is described as, “were it not that; except that; but.” As we can see, the versatility of this simple

yet complex word is endless.

Let us take a look at the way this word functions in the famous quote by rapper Drake,

“You only live once.” Catchy right? People are repeating this phrase and many others without

any knowledge of whether it practices correct grammar or not. I know what you’re thinking…

this is madness! Well let us dive into this issue so we can gather some real results and share it

with the world. The meaning behind this quote was to say something along the lines of, “you

have one life to live so live it to the fullest extent.” Instead of it being an inspirational quote,

technically it sounds something more like, “you only live.” This is because of the poor placement

of “only” acting as a modifier in the catchy phrase.

I have been consulting the wise words of Strunk, White and others trying to find out the

grammatically correct placement for only in this phrase. I was surprised to find how many others

put so much time into solving dilemmas of this kind and this one in particular. The Elements of

Style proposes a list of dozens of basic and more advanced rules of knowledge when it comes to

stylistic elements in all kinds of writing. It is certainly worth a quick read. In chapter 2 under

“Elementary Principles of Composition” you will find rule number 20 which reads, “Keep

related words together” (pp.28-31). It goes on to explain, “The position of words in a sentence is

the principle means of showing their relationship. Confusion and ambiguity result when words

are badly placed. The writer must, therefore, bring together the words and groups of words that

are related in thought and keep apart those that are not so related” (pp. 28). This is a great

informative yet simple explanation as to why it’s important to keep related words together.
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The next source that I used to gather some useful information was The New York Times

Manual of Style and Usage. I really enjoyed leafing through this short piece because it too has a

lot of useful and straightforward information. In this book they give you a long list almost

resembling a dictionary and explain the best and most effective ways to use a given word. For

the word only it suggested to “Place it next to the word it modifies. Only she tasted the rutabaga

means that no one else did. She tasted the rutabaga means that she tasted nothing else. She only

tasted the rutabaga means that she did not devour the rutabaga; she merely nibbled at it” (pp.

232). This explanation is spot on for the use of this word. It is all about where you place the word

in the sentence to correctly modify the intended word.

In Susan Thurman’s guide, The Only Grammar Book You’ll Ever Need, she gives us the

definition of an adverb which lines up with the word only in our phrase. It “is a word that

modifies (describes, gives more information about) a verb, adjective, or other adverb” (pp. 27).

In our phrase, “you only live once,” the word only is modifying the verb live. Another example

would be, “it only rained Monday.” In this sentence the word only is modifying the verb rained

giving it the meaning of the only thing that happened Monday is that it rained.

When it comes to our quote, “you only live once,” there are really a variety of solutions.

In this case in particular it is really up to you to decide in what way you are intending for the

phrase to mean. After reading through several guides the most important key factor I’ve learned

is to keep your related words together which includes keeping your modifier and the word it is

supposed to modify right next to it. In the case that you were trying to say something along the

lines of, “once, all you will do is live,” then maybe it would be best to keep the phrase as it was

originally. If you were trying to convey the message of you have one life to live so live it to the

fullest extent then perhaps you would change the phrase around to, “you live only once.” If it
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were up to me to decide I would probably choose phrasing it as, “you live only once,” as to keep

everything as it should grammatically be.

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Works Cited

Simpson, J. A., and E. S. C. Weiner. The Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd ed., vol. 5, Clarendon

Press, 1989.

Thurman, Susan. The Only Grammar Book You'll Ever Need. Adams Media, 2003.

Strunk, William, and E. B. White. The Elements of Style. 4th ed., Allyn and Bacon, 2000.

Websters New World College Dictionaries, Editors Of. Websters New World College

Dictionary, Fifth Edition. 5th ed., Websters New World, 2016.

Siegal, Allan M., et al. The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage: The Official Style

Guide Used by the Writers and Editors of the World’s Most Authoritative News

Organization. 5th ed., Three Rivers Press, 2015.

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Works Cited

Strunk, William B., and E. B. White. The Elements of Style. Pearson, 2019.