Typographic Apostrophe
The curled apostrophe (’) used in typeset text, as opposed to the straight foot-mark (').
The typographic apostrophe — sometimes called the curly, smart, or true apostrophe — is the curled mark (’) that appears in typeset English for contractions ('don’t') and possessives ('the reader’s eye'). Its shape derives from the historical mark used in handwriting and metal type. The straight apostrophe (') on modern keyboards is a survival from mechanical typewriters, where a single key stood in for both apostrophe and prime.
Confusion arises because word processors and browsers now auto-convert straight marks into curly ones, but not always correctly. The classic failure is the leading apostrophe in words like ’90s or ’tis: auto-conversion sees an opening context and inserts a left single quotation mark ('90s) rather than the correct right-curled apostrophe (’90s). Careful typesetters check every such case.
In quoted matter the typographic apostrophe should be preserved exactly as in the source — a quotation that silently modernises straight marks to curly ones (or the reverse) is doing invisible editing. In original prose, most house styles require curly apostrophes throughout, alongside curly opening and closing quotation marks; only code, plain-text formats, and certain URLs keep the straight character.
Common mistake: treating the apostrophe as interchangeable with the prime mark used for feet and minutes. They look similar in some fonts but do different jobs: the apostrophe marks omission or possession; the prime marks a unit.
“It’s the reader’s eye, in the ’90s as much as now, that finishes the sentence.”
Keep reading the glossary
Curly typographic quote marks ('smart') versus the vertical marks of typewriters and code ('straight').
The straight vertical marks (′ and ″) that denote feet, inches, minutes, and seconds — often confused with quotation marks.
The punctuation that signals direct speech or a quoted phrase — single or double, depending on locale.
A national style difference — double in American English, single in much of British English.