May 2004
"Only," the Lonely
by Robert C. Cumbow
I enjoy reading James Kilpatrick's "The Writer's Art" column every Sunday. More often than not I learn something from it. And occasionally I want to stand up and cheer because he fights the good fight, identifying and illuminating key points about language, grammar, usage, and writing style. I've even been known to write to Mr. Kilpatrick. He always writes back, from the enchanting Virginia address White Walnut Hill. (Willard Espy used to write from The Red Cottage. Writers seem to be attracted to nonnumerical addresses.)
Recently, though, I had one of my rare disappointments in Mr. Kilpatrick. He validated the use of the phrase "one of the only." True, when presented with the sentence, "Jazz is one of America's only homegrown art forms," he acknowledged that "one of America's few" would have been better. But he went on to defend "one of the only" as an idiom that we can and should learn to live with.
Now idioms aren't expected to make literal sense that's why they're classified as idioms. But "one of the only" isn't simply the kind of linguistic eccentricity that is implied by the use of the term "idiom." It's a linguistic nullity. It means nothing at all.
"Jazz is one of America's few homegrown art forms" means "America doesn't have very many homegrown art forms, but jazz is one of them." That's a conceptually meaningful thing to say. The word "few," though not precisely quantified, has meaning. The sentence suggests that America doesn't have as many homegrown art forms as other countries do, or that America's art forms are generally more imported than homegrown. And it identifies jazz as one of the honored few such art forms genuinely American and homegrown.
But "Jazz is one of America's only homegrown art forms" is nonsense. The word "only" contributes nothing to the sentence, does it? America may have one or seven or 70 or seven million homegrown art forms. However many it has, they are the "only" ones, even though there may be a lot of them. So to say "Jazz is one of America's only homegrown art forms" is no different from saying "Jazz is one of America's homegrown art forms." It's rather like saying "John F. Kennedy was one of America's only Presidents," or "Idaho is one of the only states in the United States," or "I am one of the only members of the Washington State Bar Association." It doesn't tell you anything more than, or different from, the same sentence without the "only."
The word "only" comes from an Old English word resembling "anlic," and meaning "one" or "sole." The "-lic" suffix is an early form of the "-ly" suffix that now most commonly signals an adverb, but can also indicate an adjective, such as "comely" or, well, "only." Technically, there's not much difference between "one" and "only one" both indicate a single, solitary thing. But the word "only" intensifies the oneness of the "one" and excludes all others: "He was the only one to get an A in the class"; "There's room for only one passenger."
This doesn't mean that "only" always has to be used in the sense of "one." But if you use "only" with a plural, you are using it not in the sense of "one" but in its other sense that of exclusiveness: "Only adults are permitted inside"; "Only two students scored an A for the class." So it's fine to say "She was the only girl who made the team," but if more than one girl made the team, don't tell us "She was one of the only girls who made the team," because that doesn't tell us anything that makes her achievement distinctive enough to be worthy of an "only." It could be that every girl who tried out made the team, or every girl in the entire school made the team, and the statement "She was one of the only girls who made the team" would still be true. It just wouldn't tell us anything more than "She made the team."
On the theory that every word in a sentence ought to be there for a reason, therefore, don't use "only" with a plural unless you're going to provide additional specific information to make it meaningful: "She was one of only two girls who made the team," or, if you don't know the exact number, "She was one of only a few girls who made the team." If you're going to say "one of the only" and not provide that additional information, might as well take out the "only," because it isn't serving any purpose in the sentence.
Fine only where does "only" go?
Because the word "only" acts as an intensifier, its placement in the sentence is crucial. You want to put it as near as possible to the word or phrase it intensifies. Usually, "only" should appear immediately before what it modifies. This is because "only" is usually read and heard as a "set-up" word, and people tend to apply it to whatever comes after it, not to what has gone before. A fragment will be clear enough if the word "only" follows the modified word: "Adults Only." But once you have a full sentence, ambiguity creeps in: "Adults only may swim in the pool" is less clear than "Only adults may swim in the pool."
It's well known that the meaning of a sentence is changed dramatically by variations in placement of an "only." Just taking the preceding example, we can see how that's true:
"Only adults may swim in the pool" means that no one other than an adult is allowed to swim in the pool.
"Adults only may swim in the pool" may seem to mean the same thing; but an equally reasonable reading of the sentence suggests that adults are only permitted, not required, to swim in the pool and it does not preclude that possibility that an entirely different rule applies to children.
"Adults may only swim in the pool" is a draconian instruction indeed, since it says that adults are not allowed to wade, paddle, float, or bask in the pool they may only swim there. And, again, the rule is limited to adults; we know nothing of what children may do.
"Adults may swim only in the pool" tells us that adults may swim nowhere else but in the pool; but, unlike the previous version, this one does not preclude the possibility of adults' doing other things both in and out of the pool, and it again tells us nothing of children.
"Adults may swim in the only pool" tells us that there is but one pool, and adults are permitted to swim in it; but it leaves open the possibility that adults may also swim elsewhere, and it leaves us wondering whether children are permitted in the only pool or not.
This is a simple and somewhat foolish example. But it's easy to see how the mere placement of an "only" could wreak serious havoc with the interpretation of a contract. Consider: "The aggrieved party may only sue for damages if the breaching party fails to cure the breach within 10 days of receiving written notice." Did the drafter mean that the aggrieved party can only sue, not seek to mediate or arbitrate? Or that the aggrieved party may sue for damages but may not sue for injunctive relief? Or that the aggrieved party may not sue at all unless the breaching party fails to cure within the required time? A contract term such as this one is actually less ambiguous if the "only" is left out altogether than if it is misplaced.
Just as good legal writers search their drafts for occurrences of "shall" that should be "will," or for uses of the passive voice that would read more clearly in the active voice, so should they search for all occurrences of the word "only" and make sure that (1) it serves a useful purpose in the sentence, and (2) it is in the best possible place to make the meaning clear.
Only make-believe
Now, although "only" intensifies the solitariness of whatever term it modifies "Only two can play," "You're my only friend" there is also an occasional wish to further intensify even the "only." The word "onliest" isn't found in dictionaries, but crops up frequently in Southern and African-American usage. Now logically there's no way that anything can be "more only" ("onlier"?) than something else. But sometimes nothing else will do. Jazz great Thelonious Monk came to be called "the onliest Monk" a pun on both his name and his greatness as a one-of-a-kind innovator. And partly because it can also pun on "loneliest," the coinage "onliest" has the ability to achieve a poignancy and sense of meaning-beyond-meaning that few non-words do. Now that's an idiom we can live with.
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Robert C. Cumbow is a shareholder with Graham & Dunn, Seattle, where he counsels clients in beverage, food, communications, entertainment, and other businesses on trademark, copyright, advertising, and media law. He teaches at Seattle University Law School; has written widely on law, film, food, and language; and contributes this column quarterly to Bar News.
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