Re: hideous grammar [2]

Subject: Re: hideous grammar [2]
From: Bonnie Nestor <mnj -at- ORNL -dot- GOV>
Date: Thu, 3 Aug 1995 12:40:25 -0400

> What's the plural of "Charles" as in the sentence, "I went to a party last
> night and there were seven Charless (or Charleses or Charles's) there"?
> The first isn't "correct" and it doesn't look right. The second is
> "correct" but it doesn't look right, either. The third isn't "correct"
> but it's close to correct and it looks subjectively better to some people
> than the second.

The good old Chicago Manual of Style (really old, in my case, since I'm
still on the 13th edition), says:

<begin quote>
_Proper names._ Names of persons and other capitalized names
form the plural in the usual way, by adding _s_ or _es_:
five Toms, four Dicks, and three Harrys
the Pericleses of modern times
keeping up with the Joneses
six Hail Marys
two cold Januarys
<end quote>

Just because it doesn't "look right" is no excuse -- it took me years to
get "accommodate" (two c's, two m's) to "look right" to me, and I still
have to look up "embarrassment" so as not to commit one. One of the more
loathsome aspects of modern journalism is the apparent inability of
reporters to follow this rule, so that Mr. and Mrs. Wilkes, celebrating
their golden anniversary, are referred to not as "the Wilkeses" but as
"the Wilkes" or (even worse) "the Wilke's."

Just another voice crying in the wilderness, of course.

Bonnie Nestor
mnj -at- ornl -dot- gov
DISCLAIMER: I work at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, for Lockheed Martin Energy
Systems, which is under contract to the U.S. Department of Energy -- but I
don't speak for any of them, and they return the favor.


Previous by Author: Re: gismo/gizmo
Next by Author: Re: Capitalization Question
Previous by Thread: Re: hideous grammar [2]
Next by Thread: Please enter my subscription


What this post helpful? Share it with friends and colleagues:


Sponsored Ads