I recently read a story containing its'. I was curious as to how common it might be so I used Advanced Search's Exact Match to search for " its' ". I think it took the apostrophe as the end delimiter and returned stories containing its.
Is there any way to carry out the search I wanted?
AJ
Sometimes I worry about you
Sometimes I worry about you too. Mainly that you'll die before finishing 'Beth' and 'The Anya' ;-)
AJ
Were you curious because its is possessive case so the apostrophe is not needed to make its possessive?
its' is considered an error and I wondered how prevalent it is on SOL.
Having said that, I think I've managed to construct a very contrived case where it would be correct.
AJ
I think I've managed to construct a very contrived case where it would be correct.
I'm curious as to what that case is.
In a potential sequel to King's novel, the monster It has children, naming them all "it". The original monster is therefore its' parent.
But AJ said 'very contrived', so probably had a different example in mind!
Cheers
RS
In a potential sequel to King's novel, the monster It has children, naming them all "it". The original monster is therefore its' parent.
But that's just the possessive which would be its, no '.
Multiple monsters named "it", plural: "the its", so "It is the its' parent."
Cheers
RS
But AJ said 'very contrived', so probably had a different example in mind!
Same principle though, with its being the plural of it.
Actually yours is better than mine!
AJ
To go back to your original question, I can't find a way to search on — its'
It's also true for other characters. Let's say an author used < > to indicate telepathy (instead of quotes, italics, or whatever). For the hell of it I searched on
< and> (without the space) and it found stories with "and".
If IT were information technology ITs' could work.
In that usage, IT refers to an entire industry as a whole and is therefore always singular.
