Hwy 61 PS LLC

07/07/2012

It always irks us to hear 'supposably' misused. Our preference: not to hear it at all.

Supposably is usually wrong; supposedly is usually the word you want. Find out which one you need.

06/04/2012

Only $115 to smell like a book. How about a scent to smell like the Library at Trinity College, Dublin?

Are you a serious bookworm? Are you seeking to impress people with your love of reading or attract only the most erudite of mates? Then perhaps you would like to invest in a bottle of Paper Passion, the perfume that will make you smell exactly like a freshly printed book—because, as Karl...

06/04/2012

Still true these centuries later.

06/04/2012

When an academic book manuscript is under contract and comes to my department for copy-editing, it undergoes an initial review by the assistant managing editor (yours truly) before assignment. If I find any major problems, I send the manuscript back to the acquiring editor, who returns it to the aut...

05/26/2012

This has been going on in publishing and journalism for some time, but some papers, especially online, are downright embarrassing. With cost cutting the priority over quality, I'm sure some publishers are hoping for a computer app that can replace copy editors completely sometime soon.

I remarked yesterday on the consequences of newspapers' eagerness to throw their copy editors over the side and the erosion of quality that inevitably follows. You may have imagined that I exaggerate. So let me show you a particularly painful case. 

05/23/2012

Comma sutures.

Rules about when to use and not to use commas are legion. But certain errors keep popping up.

05/18/2012

in several worlds.

05/17/2012

A cool photo that's been posted around a bit. Let the words enfold you.

05/15/2012

On Easter Sunday, 1327, a twenty-two-year-old former law student turned aspirant priest named Francesco Petracco went to mass at a church in Avignon, France. There he caught sight of a woman named Laura, and at a stroke he was condemned to lifelon

05/12/2012

Cool posting and interesting methodology. It may not be 100% conclusive in all cases, but a good indicator.

A new method reveals which pages of ancient religious texts were most frequently used—and which prayers perpetually put readers to sleep