Mischief

Quotation Marks

Updated 2006-04-01

A short investigation on the quoting practices of major media outlets. (While doing this, I realised that they form a perfect British-outside, American-inside split.)

Inside

Canada toyed with downgrading from “mid-level” to “low-level,” but eventually decided against it: the low-level diplomat is the gunboat of modern international relations and not to be deployed lightly. (New Criterion)

She starts calling him “boss.” (NY Times)

He sits out of sight of the subject, in a curtained booth with a camera and a monitor, while the subject stands ten yards away, facing a customized device that Morris calls an “interrotron.” (New Yorker)

It is well known that Native Americans had no experience with many European diseases and were therefore immunologically unprepared–”virgin soil,” in the metaphor of epidemiologists. (Atlantic)

It was a small community, made up of men who were the products of what historians call “shop culture.” (Wired)

Outside

During this time of “might made right”, excess among the rich was thoroughly encouraged. (Economist)

For her style, in particular, we were very keen on Gwendoline Riley’s Cold Water (Cape)–and in her we think we’ve discovered a much-sought after “new voice”. (Guardian)

Another sign read “Kleisterlees Lies”, referring to the company’s chairman, Gerard Kleisterlee. (BBC)

At one such piano she produces a “poem” (the lyric for I’m Not a Girl Not Yet A Woman) and, “improvising”, she and Ben turn it into a song, with which she realises her dream (entering a talent contest and undulating humourlessly up and down a pole, like Cher with a hangover). (Times)

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