James and I often rant about unnecessary quotation marks. “Who is being quoted,” is our common refrain.

Bethany Keeley took her curiosity about this phenomenon to new heights and after years of blogging, compile the best examples into The Book of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks. (Guest post by Bethany on the Chronicle Books blog.)

When quotation and attribution is unnecessary

According to the Chicago Manual of Style, “commonly known or readily verifiable facts, proverbs, and other familiar expressions can be stated without quotation or attribution unless the wording is taken directly from another source.”

Which makes me wonder, what unverifiable fact makes a “hamburger” and to whom are we attributing “live” lobsters?

I don’t trust the editorial wisdom of Wikipedia, but according to the masses, common use for quotation marks is apparently “to call attention to ironic or apologetic words.”

Day Old “Bread”
Ironic or apologetic?
Unverifiable fact?
Unfamiliar expression?

I love the quotation use in this one:

Do “NOT”
PARK here
Please

THESE PARKING SPACES ARE FOR
“CUSTOMERS”

Are we calling attention to the irony that this place has customers? Perhaps it’s all just apologetic.

Bethany Keeley’s The Book of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks is a collection of photographs of signs in stores, offices, streets and “facilities” making interesting use of our favourite punctuation mark.

And just because quotation marks can be so confounding. Here is some fun with single and double quotation marks.

Quote: “Don’t be absurd!” said Henry. “To say that‚ ‘I mean what I say’ is the same as‚ ‘I say what I mean’ is to be as confused as Alice at the Mad Hatter’s tea party. You remember what the Hatter said to her: ‘Not the same thing a bit! Why you might just as well say that “I see what I eat” is the same thing as “I eat what I see”!’ ”

The Book of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks by Bethany Keeley
Published by Chronicle Books
Distributed in Canada by Raincoast Books

Mary McCarthy’s most celebrated novel follows the lives of eight Vassar graduates (Class of ’33), known simply to their classmates as “the group.”

The tangled stories of eight different lives are united by the pivotal figure of Kay Strong–the first of the group to break from the traditions of society by getting married without parental guidance.

The social history presented here, pre-World War II, is equal in period quality to that presented in the tv show Mad Men (if not moreso).

The girls are all middle-class or upper-middle class, growing up during a revolutionary period in American life where women are forming an identity beyond their social class, beyond their parent’s social aspirations.

They work outside the home, they travel abroad alone, they philosophize, they use birth control, they buy this new thing called margarine.

All eight are in some way breaking with the past and forging a new status quo while at the same time falling into prescribed roles.

The language choice is striking and the novel’s structure of twists and turns reveals layers of insights into each character through the commentary and interior monologues of other characters.

McCarthy’s novel was published in 1963, thirty years after the time described in the novel, but the picture she paints of the times seems complete as well as insightful. (I particularly enjoyed the incredibly rich word choice and complex sentence structure. This is a novel written in a different time and its structure is reflective of the times represented.)

Quote: It was plain to Polly that many of her married classmates were disappointed in their husbands and envied the girls, like Helena, who had not got married. In June the class would have its fifth reunion and already it had its first divorcees. These hares were discussed wistfully by the tortoises of the class. It was felt that they at least had ‘done something.’ Norine Blake’s divorce, she had gone to a ranch outside Reno and now called herself ‘Mrs. Schmittlapp Blake’, had earned her a place of renowned in alumnae affairs equal to that of Connie Storey, who had become a model for Bergdorf, or of Lily Marvin, who dressed windows for Elizabeth Arden, and outranking poor Binkie Barnes, who was working as CIO organizer, and Bubbles Purdy, who was studying to be a preacher.

“A witty, moving, instructive and wise novel, a gem of American social history as well as very good fiction.” , The Nation

I concur.

Ordinary Thunderstorms is a well written book with a horrible, morally short premise. I did not like this book, but I’d still recommend it. How’s that for conflict?

Adam Kindred happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. In shock, he makes a serious of choices that make his situation worse. Throughout the book he continues to make poor decisions and yet the novel ends with no dire consequence to him. This is what I didn’t like.

What happens? (If you don’t like spoilers, stop now.)

Adam Kindred happens to meet Philip Wang in an Italian cafe. Wang forgets a file at his table. Adam decides to call him and personally return the file. He arrives at Wang’s apartment only to find Wang murdered, well, he’s not quite dead. Wang asks Adam to remove the knife stabbed into him, which Adam does. Adam’s finger prints are now on the murder weapon. Adam flees.

Adam continues to flee throughout the book. Wang’s killer continues to track Adam. The police bollocks things up. There’s conspiracy theories and secret agents. It’s all stupid, really. Adam continues to make dumb mistakes. I continued to read.

And as I mentioned, nothing really happens.

I tried not to spoil the details for you. I disliked this book, but if you like random, literary mystery stories, this is well written.