Read Sufjan Stevens' Amusing Open Letter to Miley Cyrus, in Which He Offers Grammar Tips

[DudeAsInCool]

Photo by Colin Kerrigan

Sufjan Stevens has penned a pretty hilarious open letter to Miley Cyrus on Tumblr, offering a grammar lesson in response to her song "#GetItRight". It comes off as an entertaining critique of the current abundance of open letters to Cyrus surrounding the release of her latest record, BANGERZ, this month.

Stevens wrote:

Dear Miley. I can’t stop listening to #GetItRight (great song, great message, great body), but maybe you need a quick grammar lesson. One particular line causes concern: “I been laying in this bed all night long.” Miley, technically speaking, you’ve been LYING, not LAYING, an irregular verb form that should only be used when there’s an object, i.e. “I been laying my tired booty on this bed all night long.”

He continued:

But also, Miley, did you know the tense here is also totally wrong. Surely you’ve heard of Present Perfect Continuous Tense (I HAVE BEEN LYING in this bed all night long [hopefully getting some beauty sleep?]). It’s a weird, equivocal, almost purgatorial tense, not quite present, not quite past, not quite here, not quite there. Somewhere in between. I feel that way all the time. It kind of sucks. But I have a feeling your “present perfect continuous” involves a lot more excitement than mine. 

Read the full letter here and watch Stevens' "Friendship Sleigh Ride" clip below via Pitchfork.tv:

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