Writing and speaking “correctly” is much more than just being anal retentive. Following the rules of grammar does not make you, as a writer, an obsessive, a language Nazi, or an insufferable dick. What applying the rules of grammar and proper usage show is two-fold: you care about your craft and you desire to communicate.
Would you hire an electrician who said, “Yeah, well, wires are wires. Electricity goes through. It’ll do”? Or a lawyer who said, “Settlement, schmettlement! I like to hear my own arguments, so let’s go to trial”? Similarly, do you want to read a book by an author who proclaims, “I know what I meant when I wrote it, and people should just understand it the way it is”?
No. No, you don’t. Without following the rules, your readers can get lost. Yeah, it seems tedious at times and can be a pain in the butt, and we even break the rules on purpose now and then for effect, pace, dialog, etc. Still, following the rules the vast majority of the time serves your purpose, which (aside from the cathartic value you received from the writing process) should be to communicate your story as effectively as you can.
We all learned the rules of “proper English” in grade school and junior high, to varying degrees of competency. We’ve agreed to the rules so that we can be intelligible to each other. I think writers have a duty to be effective communicators, if for no other reason than that you don’t want to look like an idiot when someone tries to read your manuscript. And it’s not about being a know-it-all fussbudget. The top reason to be a stickler for grammar should be that you have a story to tell — fiction or non-fiction — and you want to bring the reader fully into the world you’ve created.
