A Dictionary of Cont..

in anyway, he didn’t come. Here anyway is
perhaps short for anyway you look at it. The
construction is acceptable in spoken English
and in written English that hopes to capture
the force and charm of speech.
anywhere; anywheres. Anywhere is the only acceptable
form in written English. In the United
States anywheres is often heard in the speech
of well educated people, but it does not alppear
in print.
Anywhere is often used with an unnecessary
that, as in anywhere that a mule can go. This
construction has been in use for a very short
time but it is accepted English in the United
States. .
apartment. In the United States a suite of rooms
is called an apartment and treated as a singular,
as in a three-room apartment. In Great
Britain this use of the word is consildered
archaic; an apartment there means one room,
and a suite of rooms is treated as a plural and
called apartments. If treated as a singular it is
called a flat. What Americans call an apartment
hotel is known in England as a block of
service flats.
apex. See top, The plural is apices.
aphis. The plural is aphides, not aphes. A new
singular, aphid, with a regular plural aphids,
is in use and is generally preferred to the
classical aphis, aphides.
apiece; a piece. apiece means one to each or each
by itself, as Our cakes are a dollar apiece. A
piece is a fragment, as Our cake is ten cents
a piece.
apocrypha. This word, meaning a collection of
writings of doubtful authenticity, was originally
plural but is now regularly treated as a
singular, as in the apocrypha is not included.
It has a regular plural, apocryphas, meaning
more than one such collection.
When the form apocrypha was used as a
plural, meaning a number of documents, there
was a singular form apocryphon, meaning one
document. This is no longer heard in the
United States.
apocryphal means of doubtful authenticity, spurious
(The apocryphal books of the Bible are
those not included in the canon). It is used of
anecdotes and legends which cannot be shown
to be genuine (The story of his kissing the
maid is apocryphal).
apologia. The word is a singular, but is sometimes
mistaken for a plural. If a plural form
is used, it should be apologias.
apology; excuse. An apology implies that one has
been, at least apparently, in the wrong. It is
a formal word and expresses the hope of setting
things right by explaining the circumstanc:es or
by acknowledging a fault and expressing regret
for it. There is usually an element of humiliation
in having to make an apology.
An excuse is a plea in extenuation of a
more trivial fault; and where an apology
accepts guilt and seeks to make reparation, an
excuse seeks, rather, to shift the blame: and
repudiate guilt.
37 apostrophe
Since excuses and apologies are often farfetched
and do not always seem sincere to the
injured, insulted, or inconvenienced person,
both excuse and apology are used facetiously
to mean makeshift. When so used they are
often preceded by poor, shabby, or some other
derogatory adjective (a poor excuse for a
house).
Pardon me is a little stilted when used
where excuse me would be better. Excuse me
is simply a polite request to someone to let
us pass or to overlook some minor, accidental
breach of etiquette. Pardon me implies that the
other person has power over our fate and
has to be besought to forgive us.
a posteriori. See a priori.
apostles. See disciples.
apostrophe. The apostrophe is used primarily to
show that letters have been omitted, as in
we’re coming and don’t hurry. Contractions
such as these represent normal spoken English
and there is no reason why they should not
be used in writing. In speech we do not say
we are coming or do not hurry unless we want
to make the point emphatic, and the practice
of not using the contracted form in writing
sometimes gives the writing a didactic or
quarrelsome tone.
An apostrophe is sometimes used in forming
plurals of figures, letters, and words that are
not nouns but are being treated as nouns, as
in the 1920’s, your p’s and q’s, the why’s and
wherefore’s. Many publishers today omit these
apostrophes and write the 192Os, the ps and qs,
the whys and wherefores.
An apostrophe is also used to show the
genitive case of nouns, as in the horse’s mouth,
a snail’s pace, America’s heritage. It is never
used with a possessive pronoun. An apostrophe
following a personal pronoun always indicates
an omitted letter and usually a contracted is
or are. It’s means it is; who’s means who is;
they’re means they are; and you’re means you
are. There is no difference in spoken English
between the words boys, boy’s, and boys’. Since
we do not need to hear a difference in these
words in order to understand what is said, it is
obvious that we do not need to see a difference
when the words are written. The apostrophe is
entirely a printer’s problem and has nothing to
do with the language itself. It was first used to
indicate a genitive singular about 1680, and to
indicate a genitive plural about a hundred years
later. It is now in the process of disappearing.
Bernard Shaw helped to speed this by disregarding
apostrophes in his own writing. In
using a proper name it is courteous to observe
the established form, as in Teacher’s College,
the Court of St. James’s, Harpers Ferry. Otherwise,
the fewer apostrophes one uses the better.
If you use an apostrophe where it does not
belong, it shows that you do not know what you
are doing. If you omit an apostrophe where one
is usually expected, it may only prove that you
admire Bernard Shaw.
For the formation of genitive singular and