Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation’ is a non-fiction book written by Lynne Truss in 2003, which went on to become an international bestseller. The title of the book is based on the humorous story of a panda that “walks into a café. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and proceeds to fire it at the other patrons. ’Why?’ asks the confused, surviving waiter amidst the carnage, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder. ‘Well, I’m a panda,’ he says. ‘Look it up.’ The waiter turns to the relevant entry in the manual and, sure enough, finds an explanation. “Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.”
The purpose of the light-hearted book is to show that punctuation put in different places can change the meaning of sentences entirely – “panda eats, shoots and leaves” is very different to “panda eats shoots and leaves”. Another well-known example of this fact is the following: “A woman, without her man, is nothing” (no doubt said by a man) has a very different meaning to “A woman: without her, man is nothing” (no doubt said by a woman) – the same words but with different punctuation lead to a very different meaning!
It is also true to say that the meaning of a sentence can change significantly not just by using different punctuation but also by changing the order of the words – this in turn can echo how the order we place things in our life changes the meaning of our life. This may be exemplified by the very familiar sportswear company, whose name means ‘the Winged Goddess of Victory’, that has the slogan, “Just do it”. If we change the order of those three simple words, serious truth is revealed that our youngsters will do well to grasp and action.
‘Just do it’, and, for us, just do sport – what does that suggest? The inspirational expression says straight out that there is no room for excuses, explanations, questions, arguments – we must just go out and do what is expected of us. Furthermore, the expression says there is no room for laziness, pontificating, procrastinating, delay – we must just go out and do what is required of us. It is not a matter of us saying we will do it (or even how and why we will do it) but rather it is the fact that we just do it. We are not saying that we might do it (if we feel like it or if circumstances allow it) or that it might be a good idea to do it – no discussion is involved or required. In addition, the three simple words in this order imply there should be no glory-seeking, no crowd-stirring, no psyching-up, no name-calling, no finger-pointing. As with an army, whereby no explanation needs to be given to soldiers, so young players need to learn the valuable lesson of doing what they are expected, required and ordered simply to do. Children, just do sport.
The actual way we should do sport is clarified, however, when we change the order of the three simple words. ‘Do just it’ is very clear in what it is saying. We must not become side-tracked from what we are to do; if we are to succeed, we are to remain focussed and not allow lots of other things to dull our sight. We need to remember to do the one thing that is important, the one and only task before us, applying full concentration as well as commitment. Children, in sports, do just sport.
Then, too, the way we should do sport is further clarified when we change the order of the three simple words once again. ‘Do it just’ – we do not do sport any old how, haphazardly, dishonestly, unfairly. No, it is vitally important that we enable and encourage our children to do sport just – to do it right, fair, honestly, equally, consistently. It is not a matter of doing it well; it is a matter of doing it just. Winning by unfair methods is not to be an option. Children, do sport right.
As we have seen above, just as the meaning of a sentence can change significantly by changing the order of the words, just as the way we set up our team can change the way we approach and play the game, so too does the order we place things in life change the meaning of our life. Whichever way we say these three words has a great deal of significance for our youngsters playing sport and
living life. Victory will only come when we apply all of the meanings to our game. Look it up! Just do it; do just it; do it just.
