At a hotel where I stayed a few weeks ago, a strange series of events got me wondering about the stunning misuses of quotation marks.
Each night the cleaning staff would leave a note card on the bed after they had fixed the sheets. On each card was a quote (usually relating to sleep) as well as the next day’s weather prediction and an exhortation to have a good night. Pleasant enough, indeed, but if you examine a picture of one such card, you’ll notice a strange use of quotation marks.
In the picture the hotel name has been blurred. However, the significant text reads:
To achieve the impossible dream, try going to sleep. “Joan Klemper”
To be frank, I am completely at a loss for what quotation marks, used like this, could possibly be indicating. Can anyone help me out?
(Please note that we’ve deliberately blurred out the name of the hotel from the card. We did so to protect the good name of the hotel – it’s a quality chain and we don’t want people to misconstrue this post as a complaint. It’s not. It’s a quirky observation about a punctuational oddity.)
Maybe the name inside the quotation marks is a nickname, and that is the reason for the punctuation.
“Joan Klemper” may actually be a pen name???
@ Meaghan,
I prefer nom de plume. I think it is more fun to say.
But I still call them ‘Freedom Fries’. Ha-ha.