Now it
might be that technology bears its share of the blame. Certainly, my phone has
taken to autocorrecting “its” into “it’s” every time.
Particularly
irksome is a short, sneaky delay before Samsung’s gremlin imposes its will on
my punctuation. The error slips past, and my social media feed is forever
befouled. The solution: proof read every tweet, post & comment.
Which
brings me to a story.
The story
of The Wizards’ Rabbits’ Apostrophes.
First
off, let me acknowledge unconditionally and absolutely that this story was
inspired by proof-reading expert, Catriona Tippin, whose advice on every aspect
of this topic in SCBWI’s Words and Pictures has been invaluable for years. In
particular, I relied on her superb article, here:
https://www.wordsandpics.org/2015/09/proofreading-tips-apostrophes.html
Catriona,
thank you very much.
I also acknowledge
the late, great Sir Terry Pratchett as my inspiration for the setting and style
of the wizards’ rabbits’ tale - and hope that in law such fan fiction/blatant plagiarism
is OK given it’s done purely for educational purposes.
You see,
I wrote the story for colleagues faced with the daunting prospect of umpteen
thousand words of academic assignments to proof read.
It’s meant
to be a fun way to make the point that every apostrophe in every assignment ought
to be double checked because they’re devious little devils, slithering either
side of an “s”, running away for “its” and hiding in contractions like “it’s”
which aren’t allowed in academic writing.
I’ll do
the correction exercise alongside them to test myself, and also to demonstrate that even
though I’ve been a professional wordsmith for decades, and set the bloomin’ task,
Murphy’s Law suggests that I’m bound to misplace at least one or two of the
buggers.
[Typing
this post, several “apostrophe’s” have appeared as if by magic, and I’m starting
to wonder if my tech is Hubris, given a past tendency to sneer about other
people’s errors: ‘Oh, look who got that wrong. Tut, tut.’ Hopefully, that’s a
thing of the past now; life is way too stressful the sweat the small stuff.]
Anyhow,
here is the story - with all the apostrophes removed. It’s not a sparking story.
It’s not meant for kids, either. But if anyone fancies having a go at correcting it, I’ll post what
I think is the right version in the comments section in a couple of days.
Please let
me know if I make mistakes. Like I say, Murphy’s Law and all that…
THE
WIZARDS RABBITS APOSTROPHES
Tuesday
last, the wizards of Untold University held an open day to which their young
male relatives were invited, females being banned from its hallowed precincts.
Among the exhibits were rabbits, kept by the wizards in lieu of lawnmowers, but
which the denizens of Lank-Moorpuck endlessly asked to see being magicked out
of the wizards hats whenever one of them was spotted sidling along The Lashup
in search of refreshment in its seedier establishments.
Knowing
that these performances were demanded to annoy the wizards, rather than from
any fondness for magic, Untold Universitys finest had determined to distribute
their rabbits among their nephews in order to prevent any further interruptions
to the serious business of drinking.
On the appointed day the Master of Impossible Feats, Silas Graves, wasted
no time. The moment his nephew, Nigel, stepped over the threshold, Silas thrust
two white rabbits into the boys reluctant hands, and then scuttled out of the
building. The two bemused creatures were now the magicians nephews pets.
Seeing
Silas striding towards The Goblin Arms, with a bag of dwarfs gold dangling from
his belt, identical twin wizards Cornelius and Corinthian Trump stuffed their shared
rabbit into the trouser pocket of their sisters son, Humphry, then hurried
after Silas. The wizards nephews rabbit looked nervous.
On the
far side of the quad, Obadiah Ringworm was livid: the Trump brothers reputation
for boozing was legendary, and Lashup Old Peculiar in dangerously short supply due
to the brewerys draymens strike. Obadiah grabbed both his nephews by their
ears, forced them under threat of being turned into skunks into selecting a
rabbit each, then he snatched up his hat and staff and ran full pelt into town.
Ringworms nephews rabbits looked at each other - and winked.
Now, over
the years, the wizards, being careless, had spilt a great many spells in the universitys
halls, and in the quad and on its lawns. The wizards nephews rabbits had, in
consequence, dined on magical grass since birth, growing both in intelligence
and guile. They had no intention whatsoever of being handed over willy-nilly to
a bunch of spotty-faced, indolent, catapult-wielding urchins, thereby
forfeiting the pleasures of The Lashup, whose byways and back gardens housed
far fairer fluffy tails than the booze-sodden wizards could ever have imagined
in their misogynistic lives. To a rabbit, they bared their teeth, bit the
nephews down to the bone and legged it.
@HouseRowena
on Twitter
Website: rowenahouse.com
7 comments:
I have done what I think is a corrected version - is it allowed to post here, or not yet?
Hi Abby, do post. Brave soul! I'm doing the exercise with colleagues on Monday so I was going to post the version based on Catriona's advice after than, otherwise it'll feel like cheating, looking at hers beforehand.
Well done, Rowena! I always wondered what to do about stray idiots who butt into our blogspot. Let's hope they read your reply. PS Loved your blog too - while working on my current book the auto-correct has just tried to correct my it's (meaning it is) to its, which was so annoying! However, it reminded me to go back to your blog and read it again, hence finding your reply to the intruders.
Here goes then:
THE WIZARDS’ RABBITS’ APOSTROPHES
Tuesday last, the wizards of Untold University held an open day to which their young male relatives were invited, females being banned from its hallowed precincts. Among the exhibits were rabbits, kept by the wizards in lieu of lawnmowers, but which the denizens of Lank-Moorpuck endlessly asked to see being magicked out of the wizards’ hats whenever one of them was spotted sidling along The Lashup in search of refreshment in its seedier establishments.
Knowing that these performances were demanded to annoy the wizards, rather than from any fondness for magic, Untold University’s finest had determined to distribute their rabbits among their nephews in order to prevent any further interruptions to the serious business of drinking.
On the appointed day the Master of Impossible Feats, Silas Graves, wasted no time. The moment his nephew, Nigel, stepped over the threshold, Silas thrust two white rabbits into the boy’s reluctant hands, and then scuttled out of the building. The two bemused creatures were now the magician’s nephew’s pets.
Seeing Silas striding towards The Goblin Arms, with a bag of dwarfs’ gold dangling from his belt, identical twin wizards Cornelius and Corinthian Trump stuffed their shared rabbit into the trouser pocket of their sister’s son, Humphry, then hurried after Silas. The wizards’ nephew’s rabbit looked nervous.
On the far side of the quad, Obadiah Ringworm was livid: the Trump brothers’ reputation for boozing was legendary, and Lashup Old Peculiar in dangerously short supply due to the brewery’s draymen’s strike. Obadiah grabbed both his nephews by their ears, forced them under threat of being turned into skunks into selecting a rabbit each, then he snatched up his hat and staff and ran full pelt into town. Ringworm’s nephews’ rabbits looked at each other - and winked.
Now, over the years, the wizards, being careless, had spilt a great many spells in the university’s halls, and in the quad and on its lawns. The wizards’ nephews’ rabbits had, in consequence, dined on magical grass since birth, growing both in intelligence and guile. They had no intention whatsoever of being handed over willy-nilly to a bunch of spotty-faced, indolent, catapult-wielding urchins, thereby forfeiting the pleasures of The Lashup, whose byways and back gardens housed far fairer fluffy tails than the booze-sodden wizards could ever have imagined in their misogynistic lives. To a rabbit, they bared their teeth, bit the nephews down to the bone and legged it.
The one thing I wasn't sure of was whether dwarfs was plural or possessive. I have opted for plural, although dwarves is historically the English plural version - but was superseded after the Snow White film came out. So I would be happy to see dwarf's as well.
Abbey, I'm of the dwarves persuasion so I meant one dwarf but it probably makes more sense if it were plural. Shows how punctuation matters - as if we didn't know! Also, I'd no idea a film could make such a difference. Is dwarfs (plural) American, then?
And thanks, Lynne. Bots are so irksome. Interesting your autocorrect the opposite of mine. I wonder if it's a learnt algorithm.
Rowena, my impression is that dwarfs and hoofs are American plurals for dwarves and hooves. Whether this was part of Melvin Dewey's simplification of the language or other factors in play I'm not sure. But 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs' was the name of the Disney film, and that spread the 'fs' plural throughout the world. Nearly all spellchecks now reject dwarves - although they are still happy with hooves, I notice!
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