In previous posts I have mentioned the apostrofly, described in the Guardian style book as “an insect that lands at random on the printed page, depositing an apostrophe wherever it lands”. It looks like this. What then do we make of an entity that absconds from the printed page, leaving only a ghostly trace of the apostrophe it once was?
Here is an image from Frank Miller’s exceptional Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (click to enlarge):
Close examination of the word its in the first thought bubble will show you what I mean: there is visible, if only just, a faint smudge in a space that formerly accommodated an errant apostrophe. Someone spotted this apostrophe and dealt with it, presumably with a ruthless efficiency of the sort Batman employs to put evildoers out of action.
That apostrophe, once spotted, never stood a chance, but in its wake there remains an indelible mark testifying to its former corporeality. It is no longer an apostrophe, but it is evidently not nothing; I call this mark the apostrophantom. This blend describes what it denotes, and also serves to honour the much-maligned genre (superhero comics) that inspired it.
Compared with the apostrofly, the apostrophantom is an elusive creature, a rare typographical spectre. Yet it exists. We have seen it with our own eyes. And now we have photographic evidence to persuade the sceptics.
By the way, if the internal monologue illustrated above disturbs you, you wouldn’t be the only one. But rest assured that the relationship between Batman and Robin (AKA Carrie) was chaste, and that the writer knew exactly what he was doing.
September 17, 2009 at 1:17 pm
“presumably with a ruthless efficiency of the sort Batman employs to put evildoers out of action”
You’ve just put in my head an image of the Joker putting all kinds of unnecessary apostrophes into books, then taunting the general public about it and driving Batman into a Tippex-wielding storm of correction. A Dark Knight for proofreaders, perhaps…
September 17, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Doubtful: That sounds highly entertaining! Yes, it would be “a Dark Knight for proofreaders”: Batman Begins but never finishes because there are just too many typos, more and more of them inspired by sheer malevolence. And it’s only a matter of time before the Joker joins forces with The Riddler and his quarry of question marks to unleash a maelstrom of out-of-control punctuation marks. Batman will need a new and tireless sidekick – Lynne Truss, perhaps.
September 17, 2009 at 11:05 pm
apostrofly and apostrophantom are both great portmanteaus :-P
September 18, 2009 at 8:57 am
Thanks Andrew. Although it has been almost seven years since Ian Mayes introduced the apostrofly (“like an insect [...] over the dining table, alighting where it will”), I have yet to encounter a better explanation of certain apostrophe-related phenomena. Given the apostrophantom’s scarcity I don’t expect the term to enter any dictionaries any time soon, but at least now it has a modest profile on Wordnik!
September 18, 2009 at 12:27 pm
These terrifying smudges leave the reader wondering what the righter really meant.
September 18, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Terrified: I suppose the writer meant its but confused it with it’s. Many do. The mark’s rather muddled history [PDF, 139 KB] probably contributes to the confusion – as does the confusion itself, since it seems to be contagious.
September 18, 2009 at 9:08 pm
Quebec, Canada must be the world capital of the astrophantom. By the early ’80s the provincial government had required the suppression of all apostrophes in business names to ensure the “French face” of commercial life here. We suspect that somewhere in Quebec there may now be a warehouse full of discarded apostrophes.
September 20, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Don: Governmental suppression of apostrophes? Their existence is even more contentious than I thought, and that of apostrophantoms perhaps more prevalent! Imagine the havoc if that warehouse’s contents fell into the wrong hands…
Your story reminds me of the Irish government’s controversial decision a few years ago to change the name of Dingle to An Daıngean. Luckily no apostrophes were involved in this case.