Rules on Commas

Rules for commas:

1)   They divide items in lists, but are not required before the “and” on the end.

Example: the four refreshing fruit flavors of Opal Fruits are orange, lemon, strawberry and lime.

The rule here is that the comma is correct if it can be replaced by the word “and” or “or”

Example: The four refreshing fruit flavors of Opal Fruits is orange and lemon and strawberry and lime

Note: It is not incorrect to put a comma before the “and” at the end

Example: The four refreshing fruit flavors of Opal Fruits are orange, lemon, strawberry, and lime.

2)   Commas are used when two complete sentences are joined together using such conjunction as “and”, “or”, “While” and “Yet”

Example: The boys wanted to stay up past midnight, but they had a race to run the next day and their coach told them “no”.

Note: a comma splice occurs when you use a comma when a semi-colon is called for.

Example: It was Queen’s birthday on Saturday, she received a lot of presents.

It should be written: It was queen’s birthday on Saturday; she received a lot of presents.

Or: It was Queen’s birthday on Saturday, and she received a lot of presents.

3)   Comas fill gaps where other words might go

Example: Annie had dark hair; Sally, fair

4)   Commas before direct speech.

The queen said, “It’s my birthday and I want lots of presents”

Note: Many authors use colons: these days. Joyce used dash-.

5)   Commas set off interjections

Example: Stop, or I’ll scream.

6)   Commas set aside non-essential information.

Example: John Keats, who never did any harm to anyone, is often invoked by, grammarians.