Should "request-after-request" be hyphenated?

Question

"All day I get request-after-request for help on passing the Quality Assessment."

The sentence above was originally written as, "All day I get request after request for help on passing the Quality Assessment."

I changed "request after request" to "request-after-request," but was told that I was wrong.

Is request-after-request correct?

Google Ngram says Ngrams not found: request-after-request. — Elliott Frisch, Commented Jul 28, 2017 at 2:51
No need to hyphenate in that setting, and we can appreciate the request-after-request irritation. The three words take the place of 'serial requests' and no more. I might add 'long', as in All day long. — Yosef Baskin, Commented Jul 28, 2017 at 3:31
Hyphenation makes sense when request after request is used as an adjective, as in Yosef Baskin's comment, where it is used for clarity to modify irritation. Otherwise hyphenation is incorrect. — Richard Kayser, Commented Jul 28, 2017 at 4:04
request-after-request makes a negative thing into a real concept. — JMP, Commented Jul 28, 2017 at 7:55

Myungjin Hyun · Accepted Answer · 2017-07-28 07:22:56Z

1

No, hyphenation is definitely wrong in that context. Hyphenation is used only when the word becomes attributive.

answered Jul 28, 2017 at 7:22

Myungjin Hyun

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