The Editor's Blog

You are an editor. Your friends and colleagues say you are nit-picky and anal, but you know the truth: You just like being right. The Editor's Blog is designed to be both a resource for you (whether "editor" is your job title or obsession) and a sounding board for you to share the many annoying and egregious errors you come across to others who will appreciate them (because your husband or sister or roommate is tired of listening to you). I hope you will share editing experiences and opinions on certain subjective edits like the serial comma and UK vs. U.S. English, as well as grammar bloopers, pet peeves, and other questions and/or reference materials you have. If anything, I hope this blog spares you the embarrassment of asking a friend or colleague a question that they think (and you know) you should know the answer to. After all, you like being right.

Monday, August 23, 2004

The Apostrophe Protection Society

Yes, one reallly does exist.

The Apostrophe Protection Society was started in 2001 by John Richards, now its Chairman, with the specific aim of preserving the correct use of this currently much abused punctuation mark in all forms of text written in the English language.

The rules concerning the use of Apostrophes in written English are very simple:
1. They are used to denote a missing letter or letters.

2. They are used to denote possession.

3. Apostrophes are NEVER ever used to denote plurals!

Check out some examples of apostrophe misuse on the site's Examples Page.


posted by Katie and Chris @ 8:38 AM  

1 Comments:

  • At August 23, 2004 at 2:43 PM, Blogger Katie and Chris said…

    Rayshel:

    "Celebrating John Williams's 25 years with the ____ orchestra."

    The person who told you it could be used either way was correct. I prefer Williams' to Williams's, but both are fine. Here are the correct forms:

    If there are two or more Williamses, celebrating the same anniversary, the apostrophe comes after the "s."

    the Williamses' anniversary

     

Post a Comment

<< Home

 
  • ATOM