How many ss does it take to change a lightbulb?

[ritaxis]

[Poll #1088629]

Comments

[brooksmoses]

Having a personal stake in the matter, I definitely prefer the "'s" even when the singular noun ends in "s". And I don't even notice that the three "s"es in a row in "boss's" is weird; it looks perfectly reasonable to me.

Part of my reasoning on this is that I pronounce the possessive "bosses", not "boss", so it should have an additional "s" compared to "boss".

[janetmk.livejournal.com]

The usage I sort of learned and what Fowler says is to use the 's in one and two syllable names and in multi-syllable names accented on the next to last syllable. Though he says it's customary to omit the s if the final syllable is pronounced "iz" and in ancient classical names.

[karinfromnosund.livejournal.com]

It looks ok then me, actually, but there is always the option of rephrasing. I might do that if I had to use it often.

[del-c.livejournal.com]

I think "Tomas" is a person and "the boss" is a thing, even if the latter is capitalized. I would not omit the ess from "the national press's reaction", to make "the national press' reaction", because there's a "the" there. But if you were to write of a character called "Press", then the only reason I would not go with "Press' wishes" is that "Press" has one syllable.

If the character were "Parris" I would totally say "Parris' wishes", but I would not say "the local parish' rules", it would be "the local parish's rules".

If your "Tomas" had a line of robots named after him, I would change "Tomas' wishes" to "the Tomas's programming". The "the" would trump the name for me.

So, my personal rule, omit the final ess only where the name ends with ess, has more than one syllable, and is a *proper* noun—that is, a real name.

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

That would work if we were speakers of Mixtec, yes.

[shsilver.livejournal.com]

My understanding is that names that end in an "s" take 's unless they are of Greek origin or the name of the Christian son of G-d. Thus:

Aristophanes'
Jesus'
Thomas's
Parris's

What I want to know is how you turn a name that is a possessive into a possessive, such as something belonging to the company with the Golden Arches:
McDonald's's? McDonald's'? McDonald's?

[davidgoldfarb.livejournal.com]

Er, you do realize that "...of Greek origin" and "...the name of the...son..." aren't disjoint sets? (Okay, it's Latinized, but still.)

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

I didn't! I thought it was ultimately a Hebrew name, and only the Christ part was Greek. Thank you.

[davidgoldfarb.livejournal.com]

Well, that's what I get for posting early in the morning.

(Hush.)

Yes, of course it is ultimately a Hebrew name, and it was silly of me to forget that -- I've seen both "Yeshua" and "Yehoshua". But we get "Jesus" from Latin "Iesus" from Greek "Ἰησοῦς".

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

I don't know. I get wobbly feelings trying to remember what I've said in the past, let alone what I should write.

[zeborah]

I sort of go by sound: thus Lars' (because it's /z/) but Tomas's and definitely boss's (because it's /s/). --Even though I'd *say* "Lars's" (/larziz/). I'm not going to think about this too much, I've revised that book enough already.

[ritaxis.livejournal.com]

Don't think about it at all. You get points just for using Lars as a name. It's one of my favorites.