Each week The Old Editor will attempt to address
your entreaties for information and advice on grammar and usage, writing, writer-editor etiquette, and related subjects.
The Old Editor does not address marital and relationship matters, dietary questions, or automobile mechanics.
This week's question: "Should the phrase 'each other's' be followed by a singular or plural noun? 'Each' would seem to call for a singular noun, but I've also heard the argument that the expression suggests a reciprocal relationship that would justify the plural. What do you think?"
The supplicant provided an example: "They shook each other's hand."
The Old Editor answers: Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage says that the noun following each other's can be singular or plural, depending on context. It quotes Alfred North Whitehead writing that "all entities or factors in the universe are essentially relevant to each other's existence" and Current Biography as writing that "its members still frequently exchange visits to each other's homes."
In "they shook each other's hand," they presumably have two hands, and the plural would make more sense. We can perhaps generalize to say that we use the plural when we're dealing with count nouns (hands) and the singular when we are dealing with a mass noun (existence).
Before we leave each other, we might have a look at the each other/one another distinction beloved of generations of copy editors. The distinction is that each other must be restricted to two persons, beyond which you have to use one another.
Bryan Garner observes that usage is inconsistent, concluding, "Careful writers will doubtless continue to observe the distinction, but no one else will notice."
MWDEU traces the distinction back to the eighteenth century and thinks that the rule "was cut out of whole cloth," observing that OED citations show "that the restriction has never existed in practice" and that the interechangeability of each other and one another has been well established for centuries.
It says that "a few commentators believe the rule to be followed in 'formal discourse.' This belief will not bear examination; Samuel Johnson's discourse is perhaps the most consistently formal that exists in English literature, and he has been cited in violation of the rule." ("Sixteen ministers who meet weekly in each other's houses" in the Life of Swift, for example.)
You are, of course, perfectly free to observe the each other/one another distinction if it suits you. I merely pose one question, assuming that you are as hard-pressed as your colleagues in the rapidly dwindling ranks of copy editors: How much of your energy, your time, and your attention are you prepared to expend on an illusory distinction.?
A bonus question from a fellow longtime laborer in the vineyard of editing:
1. What's with capping The?
2. Where do you get off calling yourself old, you whippersnapper?
The Old Editor answers:
1. Whim.
2. Becoming a cranky old guy has been the labor of my entire adult life. You're not taking it away from me.
Got a question for The Old Editor? Write to him at john.mcintyre@baltsun.com.