Caring about how the words in a sentence slot together can feel like a lonely business. There is an early scene in the film Broadcast News, in which the young Aaron Altman (who grows up to be a brilliant but spiky news reporter, played by Albert Brooks) is being beaten up in high school by the class bullies. As he struggles to his feet, he comes up with what he believes will be a devastating putdown: ‘You’ll never make more than nineteen thousand dollars a year!’ They grab him by the hair and carry on punching him. He tries again, this time with a mouth full of blood: ‘Okay, take this: You’ll never leave South Boston and I’m going to see the whole damn world!’ As they twist his arm round his back and scrape his face against the concrete, he delivers his coup de grace: ‘You’ll never know the pleasure of writing a graceful sentence!’ They punch him in the stomach, he sinks to the ground and they walk away.