The question is how to interpret the comma after “free state.” Justice Antonin Scalia, the author of the ruling, wrote that the comma set apart a mere preface to the “operative clause” of the ...

And if you add the wrong punctuation mark or leave it out, you may regret it. Suddenly, that little dot or dash you barely ...

“People don’t know why they get so upset about language,” David Crystal told me recently, over Skype from his home in Wales. “ ‘Potato’s,’ with an apostrophe ‘S,’ ” he offered, as an example of the ...

The digital age has not been kind to the English language. Capitalization, proper spelling, and punctuation long ago became optional when texting friends or chatting online. The period was one of the ...

One of the difficulties about punctuation is that a lot of it is down to personal preference or “style”. And that isn’t just a recent thing, to be blamed on textspeak and the belief that the world is ...

Not long ago, if I saw a sentence like “Tommy gets A’s and B’s,” I would have changed it to “Tommy gets A’s and Bs.” But only if I was working for a publication that followed Los Angeles Times’ ...

Punctuation marks may be small, but they carry a lot of weight—shaping tone, clarifying meaning and even signaling the writer’s personality. I adore the em dash; I tend to be a bit of a drama queen ...

Are you manic about misplaced commas? Apoplectic over rogue apostrophes? Distressed by the disappearing question mark? You don’t have to be an outspoken member of the punctuation police to know the ...

Though one of the greatest poets who ever lived struggled with commas, many of us are infuriated by rogue apostrophes and other printed solecisms. How did this come to be? Imagine this. You are a ...