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Tue 15 Jan, 2013 05:40 am
"Precious few relationships in my life are like my friendship with Nancy. We’ve had disagreements, of course, but in thirty years the worst one remains the time in college Nancy copied my outfit to wear to a party.
Nancy and I could have gone to a motel for our trip and still it would have been special.
It wasn’t going to be as easy with others, I knew. Even with John and the kids. And certainly not with my mother, Theodora 'Tee' Spencer. "
In the last paragraph, why does the author use the quotation marks on her mother's name?
@Justin Xu,
Tee is not her name. Her name is Theodora. The author is indicating that Tee was the nickname, the name by which everyone knew her, and which was based on the name Theodora. For example, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the 35th President of the United States. His friends and family called him Jack, which is a nickname for John. So, one would write John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy, to indicate that Jack is a nickname.
@Justin Xu,
The quotation marks enclose the entire piece.
@nextone,
Sorry. I mean the last sentence. The mother's name part.
Because her name was Theodora, but she was called Tee.
Usually that's done when a person uses a nickname, or it's known they really don't like to go by their given name.
Form instance, it's pretty much understood if someone's name is Thomas, they would probably go by Tom, so no quotation marks would be needed. However, if he was known to everyone as Tommy Boy, something might read...
Cookies and Pepsi Cola were provided by Thomas "Tommy Boy" Wilson.
@ehBeth,
And we often call Richard "Rich" because he doesn't like being called "Dick".
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