back
7 comments
Previous discussions of Pullum's critique of Strunk and White:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=557618

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=566335

the second link is the bestester of the too.
Looks like a bunch of good points held together by diatribe. S&W is a good book. The list of errata would be more helpful without the ranting.

Example: Prescriptive grammar didn't rely so much on evidence. That's a truism that (a) doesn't tell us much about E.B. White's personal character flaws ("arrogance"), and (b) leaves us awfully starry-eyed and idealistic about the downsides of descriptive grammar. Who knows what they'll say about us in fifty years?

Pullum, the author, is a regular contributor to Language Log, which is highly recommended.

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/

Finally, it is fixed https://hg.python.org/peps/rev/b93d501ba313
Wasn't broken to begin with.
Depends on whether you think one should follow Mr Strunk and Mr White (plural) or their book (singular). It always irked me that PEP8 insisted that you become a stalker.