An Apostrophe Catastrophe

Clockwise from top-left: You tell me what that means!; How in the heck?; I wonder if Go knows his stuff is being auctioned?; Do the hats and gloves belong to Snow Toy, perhaps?

Teasing business owners and whoever it is that does the boards outside churches is too easy. This is low hanging fruit for grammar mavens and we really should know better (and be more magnanimous generally).

These poor folks are trying so hard to get it right that they get it wrong. Not at all uncommon in English.

We all know that the god-forsaken apostrophe is the worst, most heinous and evil punctuation mark in the language. Just when you think you have it nailed, you get pulled over and booked for a stray it’s when you meant its. I should know, it happened to me once in my editing course! (Yes, I lost a mark for that, deservedly so. In an editing course, like, wow.)

Yet, for all that, the rules are pretty simple.

Two major uses and a little one.

First off, the big baddy, the possessive.

We use an apostrophe to indicate that something belongs to someone. Normally it is deadly simple – you just add an apostrophe and an s, even in names that end in s (and the extra s is pronounced, by the way):

That is James’s book.

The cat belongs to Jane. It is Jane’s cat.

There is a lot to do, there is a week’s work ahead.

But then it gets complicated.

Plural nouns that end in s just take an apostrophe without the s:

Put that in the girls’ room

I sense there is many weeks’ work there.

Generally speaking, if the plural form is pronounced without that extra ess sound, then you don’t add an s after the apostrophe. That’s why famous names like Ulysses and Moses just take an apostrophe without the extra s.

THE HARD BIT:

Pronouns. These NEVER take an apostrophe in the possessive. Which is easy for a word like ours.

That pizza is ours.

But it also applies to the possessive form of its. The pages of a book belong to the book and are thus possessed by the book:

The book was wet. Its pages were soaked.

It is the cat’s head:

The cat raised its head.

The possessive form of a pronoun never takes an apostrophe.

So, what’s the deal with it’s then? That leads us to the other major use of the apostrophe:

Contractions.

It seems completely logical – when you shorten a word, or when you join two words (or more) together, you put an apostrophe in place of the missing letters.

So, for starters:

It is becomes it’s. 

(See – simple – it’s is a completely different word to its, how could you ever get them confused?)

Will not becomes won’t.

And so on, quite familiar I’m (I am) sure.

When you join words, be a little careful:

Are not becomes aren’t, not are’nt because the apostrophe replaces the missing letter, not the space between the former two words. And then it gets curious with triple word contractions like he’d’ve for he would have (really if you’re—you are—going that far, you probably know what you’re doing and would only use that to represent speech, not in a formal writing context.)

Generally, if you can make two words out of it, an apostrophe belongs in there. If there are letters missing, an apostrophe takes their place. Be careful of old words like o’clock which is a traditional contraction of of the clock.

Finally, “clipped forms” do not need an apostrophe. It is gym, not gym’ (gymnasium). Hippo, not hippo’ and so on.

On the matter of it’s versus its, the simple test is to see if the sentence makes sense with “it is” instead. If it does, then it is it’s. If it doesn’t it’s its. Easy.

AND FINALLY, the fly in the ointment:

Unusual Plurals.

As a rule, you never use an apostrophe in a plural. This is what trips up sign writers all the time.

There’s something about seeing an s at the end of a word that makes us think an apostrophe might be needed. God Loves You becomes God Love’s You, which is doing my head in right now. What could that mean? I belong to “God Love”? Am I blessed?

There are exceptions though.

When you start referring to numbers in the plural… take this series for instance:

1,2,3,3,3,4,5,5,5,5,6

In describing this, I might say there are three 3’s and four 5’s, but then I might say 3s and 5s. Usage here varies from place to place.

Likewise, I was born in the 1970’s is a more American usage where 1970s seems to suffice elsewhere.

But if you’re referring to plural letters, you need that apostrophe otherwise it becomes nonsense:

How many o’s and l’s are there in soliloquy?

So, to summarise in general terms:

• If it belongs to someone or something it requires that apostrophe (unless it is its).
• If it is a plural, no apostrophe.
• If it is a contraction, it needs an apostrophe.

Some linguists challenge the need for the apostrophe at all, saying that you can usually understand the meaning in context.

With this in mind, I hazard to suggest: if in doubt, leave it out when it comes to apostrophes. This works because then the only mistake you’re likely to make is the its/it’s one. The contractions normally make perfect sense without the apostrophe. Plurals basically shouldn’t have them, and the possessive form is mostly common sense.

Happy trail’s trails…

Commas. The horror!

The comma. The enemy of every Grammar-Nazi (although probably just behind errant apostrophes in ire-creation, but we'll save THAT for another episode).

Why do people struggle so much? The rules aren't that complicated. I think it's due to three issues that swirl around commas like grammatical tornadoes that refuse to die.

The first is a terrible piece of advice given to us when we are young that, ironically, was correct in English centuries ago but incorrect in standard English today, namely: "Put a comma in where you would have a pause." WRONG.

The second problem is the "Oxford Comma". There are people who love them and people who hate them and the very fact they argue just muddies the water around correct comma usage. I think the Oxford Comma is very useful.

The third is the sloppy use of bracketing commas. Read on to learn more.

There are four uses of the comma: lists, joins, gaps, and brackets.

The Listing Comma.

The easy one. You simply put a comma between the items in a list with an "and" (or "or") before the final item. An Oxford Comma comes before the final "and" or the "or" in a list. It can be very useful to avoid ambiguity. Use it for that reason rather than because you have a thing for Oxford commas.

There's no equivalent to the Oxford Comma in any of the other usages. That is worth remembering for street fights over commas. The Oxford Comma applies ONLY TO LISTS.

The other helpful trick with listing commas is that you should be able to replace all the commas with "and" and it should still make sense (albeit clumsily). If adding "and" makes it nonsensical then a comma would be incorrect too.

"His bold, innovative, daring approach was extraordinary." can become "His bold and innovative and daring approach was extraordinary." The commas are fine.

If we were talking about "His bold, daring runway approach...", we could replace that first comma with "and", but we can't put a comma between daring and runway because "and" wouldn't work either. It's dependent on what the adjectives are modifying - "daring" modifies "runway approach" as a whole, not "approach".


Joining Commas.

These join two complete sentences into one sentence. The comma must have a connecting word after it, chosen only from and, or, but, while or yet. I used one above (the second comma):

If we were talking about "His bold, daring runway approach...", we could replace that first comma with "and", but we can't put a comma between daring and runway because "and" wouldn't work either.

That could have been a full-stop (period) followed by "We can't put..."

If you don't use the connecting word, in this case "but", you commit the cardinal sin of a comma splice. Don't fall into the trap, kids.


Gapping Commas.

These indicate where words have been removed for brevity. It should be done with caution and judgement.

Some football teams like singing their song before the game; others, only if they win.

That last comma replaced "like singing their song". We know what was meant in context. If that meaning is unclear, don't replace the phrase or words with a comma at all.


Bracketing Commas.

THE (EXTREMELY USEFUL) BUGBEAR.

These do what they say on the tin: they bracket an interruption in the sentence.

Check your punctuation with this easy test:

Take out the commas and everything in between. Does it still make sense and convey the meaning you intended?

If you answer "yes" you're doing it right. That's what bracketing commas do: they enclose a weak interruption that is useful but not essential.

If you answer "no" you're doing it wrong. Either remove the commas entirely or move them around.

Yet, beyond that glass, lay a toxic world. 

Wrong. If you take "beyond that glass" out you get "Yet lay a toxic world." That doesn't work at all. Leave the commas out: Yet beyond that glass lay a toxic world.

He reached over the car seat, and finding a dummy, gave it to the baby. 

Wrong. The first comma should be after "and" for the same reasons. In this case because "finding a dummy" is an interruption that is very helpful to meaning but not essential to the sentence.

A variant on the bracketing comma is the comma that precedes the addition of a non-restrictive clause in a periodic sentence. That's a bit technical, but it's the comma that you put before a further clause with additional information. English allows an infinite number of these to be added to any sentence. This is why English has infinite scope for creativity.

"He drove the car, squinting through the dirty windscreen, lighting a cigarette as he steered with his knees, worrying about what his girlfriend had said the other day, barely watching the road, knowing he was in trouble."

All those clauses after commas are non-restrictive. Each could be removed without harming the sentence. "He drove the car." Dull, but still functional as a sentence.


Misuse of bracketing commas often leads to sentences with far too many commas. When you add in commas of the other varieties a sentence can bristle with punctuation and prickle the skin of language mavens everywhere. Don't prick the skin of the beast with bad comma usage. There are far more forgivable mistakes to make!

Until next time...