In defence of the word ‘so’

Much has been written in these pages about the modern tendency to start sentences with ‘so’.  It’s been called an ‘irritating adornment’ portentously announcing the arrival of a new thought but adding nothing to its expression.

I often find myself opening sentences with ‘so’ and I feel entirely relaxed about it.

‘So’ has a long history. Shakespeare’s Duke of Gloucester may not have said: ‘So, now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York’ but his Tarquin (in The Rape of Lucrece) had no such linguistic scruples: ‘“So, so”, quoth he, “these lets attend the time, Like little frosts that sometime threat the spring…”’.

And while it may add little to the meaning of sentences, ‘so’ still plays a role. Not every word we use in English is there to contribute to meaning. Some are what linguists call ‘discourse markers’. These help us follow the flow of conversation.