Apostrophe Help Please

Can someone please help me with the apostrophe rules. I’ve never quite understood….

Do you mean the apostrophe for the possessive case?

(Btw, ellipsis is only three dots)

Possessive apostrophes change depending on whether the noun is singular or plural.

‘The boy’s bag was in the cloakroom,’ for one boy.

‘The boys’ bags were in the cloakroom,” for more than one boy.

This isn’t the case if the noun has already been pluralised, e.g. if ‘child’ has already been pluralised to ‘children’, making a new word, it would be, ‘The children’s bags were in the cloakroom.’

Apart from possessive apostrophes, there are apostrophes for contractions - shortened words, e.g. can’t, didn’t. These just indicate a missing letter or letters.

Avoid using apostrophes for plurals, e.g. ‘There were twenty girl’s at football training.’ Plurals don't need apostrophes unless as cited above for the possessive case.

I hope that helps. 🙂X

Thank you

A good explanation above. If I can just point out the difference between its and it's as these are commonly misused. Some people write sentences like 'Covid has taken it's toll on the national health service.'

Because it's feels like a possessive, you see this sort of hyper correction. But in sentences like this, always use its. Another example: 'The dog dropped its ball down the drain.'

It's is just an abbreviation of it is.

D x

Another complication occurred to me. In words like ‘wives’, although it has already been pluralised from wife, the possessive form would be wives’, e.g. “The wives’ bags were retrieved from the cloakroom.” This is because the word already ends with ‘s’ so another ‘s’ would be superfluous. With names that end with ‘s’, the jury is out. James’s or James’ are both acceptable.

It’s a minefield. 🤣X

I wrote and posted my first story " A Twenty year Fantasy".

Can you please give me suggestions to improve my next one.

Quote by LBman59

I wrote and posted my first story " A Twenty year Fantasy".

Can you please give me suggestions to improve my next one.

Specifically in relation to apostrophes?

This question brings to mind, the Million Dollar Apostrophe Law suit that went on for years between two premium wines makers in Napa. Both were granted the name Stags Leap, on the same day unknowingly by a Federal Agency (COLA). This was in the late 60's or early 70's. The case bounced back and forth between the trial court and the appellate court for years and was finally decided by the California Supreme Court in 1986. One winery was awarded the name Stag's Leap Wine Cellars, and the other Stags' Leap Winery. Each was forbidden to make the wine that made the other one famous. i.e. Stag's Leap couldn't make Petit Sarah and Stags' couldn't make Cabernet Sauvignon.