Talk:Coxton Tower

Via or by
Hi Autodidact1, now I'm in front of my computer I wanted to respond more fully. I am usually fine about being corrected in errors in my prose (and indeed have thanked Giraffedata twice when they've caught me using 'comprised of'). I confess though to being irked by the tone of your edit summaries: so far, you have connected the words 'pretentious', 'lazy' and 'stupid' to the use of the word 'via'. Given that the use of the word was mine, it's hard to take that as constructive criticism. You've also presented no evidence to support your assertion that 'by' is the correct preposition to use here.

I'm afraid that using the word 'by' as the preposition there sounds very awkward to me. A person doesn't reach the entrance by a stairway, they reach the entrance by using a stairway, or by ascending a stairway. My Collins dictionary gives me three definitions of 'via' - 'by way of', 'through' and 'by means of', the last of which is exactly the meaning I was trying to convey here. I then checked Fowler's Modern English Usage (2008 edition), which tells me that the word derives form Latin but is now "thoroughly naturalised" in English usage. The MOS has nothing to say on the matter, as far as I can tell. So I can't really see what your problem with it is.

I realise that I'm probably being a bit defensive here, and that I do not own the article, but having done the research, written the article from scratch and taken it through a Good Article review, I've probably got a bit more invested in this than you have, and the words you chose to use in your edit summaries were offensive and unnecessary. Nobody else at any stage of review (for GA or DYK) has made any comment about that word. If you have any evidence to back up your assertion that 'by' is a better word to use here I'll be prepared to consider it and discuss, but please no more of the invective. Thanks Girth Summit  (blether)  16:42, 28 August 2019 (UTC)