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After showing me the house, Nana led us to the living room, and with Mongai's Take Me Somewhere Nice playing on in the background, we started on the Scotch we'd bought at the 7-Eleven. The dim light and the soft

Is the comma correctly positioned before the italics in the example above? Or I should place the comma after and?

mplungjan
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wyc
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    What does "smoke above" mean? – Noah Aug 06 '13 at 08:21
  • Sorry I typed the question from my phone (I think it wasn't a good idea). I fixed all the inconsistencies. – wyc Aug 06 '13 at 08:47
  • general reference? https://www.google.com/search?q=comma+parenthetical+phrase – mplungjan Aug 06 '13 at 08:49
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    After showing me the house, Nana led us to the living room and () we started on the Scotch we'd bought at the 7-Eleven - so comma after the and – mplungjan Aug 06 '13 at 08:51
  • That is not necessarily a parenthetic phrase: it’s also simply a clause that acts as a sentential adverbial. As such, there is no need for a comma before it. It is not wrong to add a comma, in which case it is explicitly made parenthetical, but the sentence flows more elegantly without it in my opinion. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Aug 06 '13 at 08:55
  • As I commented earlier, “playing on the background” is non-standard, and you fixed it via “playing on in the background”, ie striking on and inserting in. I forgot to mention that “playing on in the background” is also a possibility. You'd use it if you meant to say the music still continued playing (that is, played on) in the background. – James Waldby - jwpat7 Aug 06 '13 at 15:13

2 Answers2

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It may be preferable to eliminate the comma and instead insert a period. The first sentence seems like a separate event from the second sentence.

After showing me the house, Nana led us to the living room. With Mongai's "Take Me Somewhere Nice" playing in the background, we started on the Scotch we'd bought at the 7-Eleven.

Andrew Ng
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With any such sentence, read it with and without the parenthetical -- that should make matters clearer.

In the instant case, and is a part of the parenthetical, and rightly belongs inside the pair of commas.

Kris
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