The shooting script titles the episode "Lovers Walk" and also refers to the Council as "the Watcher's Council".
I vote for "pig's blood"--I couldn't find any shooting script back-up evidence (and I'm tempted to Tweet Jane E. about it... maybe someone other than me will). But if you were just referring to it without the possessive form, I think it would be "pig blood" like "cow blood" or "human blood". I just have trouble seeing the plural used when combining two nouns all Anglo-Saxon style.
Shark blood. Sharks blood. It sounds weird. Cow blood. Cows blood. Goat blood. Goats blood. The plural just doesn't look right to me.
So, who's the specific Watcher who owns the Council? :)
I could never quite decide whether it was "pig's blood" or "pigs' blood" - and now my editing course has informed me that, in fact, "pigs blood" would be perfectly alright. So I'm rather confused...
*checks some more* Giles calls them the "Council of Watchers" in Checkpoint but again in Triangle it's "Watcher's Council".
I tend to think the Council views themselves as one entity. Quentin even implies that in how the Slayer dies, the Council remains. So I can see them looking at themselves so much as one body that they call themselves "the Watcher's Council". The great body as a whole is The Watcher. The individuals are watchers. I think it's an idiosyncrasy that relies upon self-determination of identity, not the rules of grammar per se.
Actually, that's now making me flash back to the Buffy movie - with the Watcher who keeps getting reincarnated. So in every generation there's the Slayer and the Watcher, who are the same person, over and over again...
I'm undecided on the first one - is it a Council OF Watchers, or a Council FOR Watchers? I think it could go either way, but I tend to use "Watchers' Council" in fics, for reasons I can't quite explain.
"Lovers Walk," because that's what it says on my DVD, and I'm assuming they know what the title is supposed to be.
"Pig's blood," because it's blood that comes from a pig.
Yes, but are they using the blood from a pig, or a group of pigs whose blood is all mixed together? Or is it a theoretical pig who stands in for pigness as a whole - like if you say "the kangaroo is a marsupial" you actually mean all kangaroos rather than just one?
If it relies on if it's from one pig or several, then the circumstances would change with every time the blood is used. One time it might be from just one pig, other times from several. In that case, there can be no universally correct term--not while relying upon variable contingencies.
The vicissitudes of punctuationdiebirchenJune 3 2010, 03:58:46 UTC
Well, what the show intended vs what would be literally and most accurately correct according to the rules of punctuation are possibly two separate issues. As to the first, "Watchers'" is most logical, because it is the council of plural watchers. That watchers consider their council one entity is covered by the singular collective noun "council," not by the possessive, therefore adjectival-ish form, of the noun that describes it. In the second case, I believe no possessive was intended in the episode title. It's simply a statement of what happens: noun and verb. Some of the lovers do "walk" as in "leave" their belovéd. As to the much defamed and allegédly foul-tasting pigs' blood, I figure that at any butcher's shop [probably the shop of one butcher, in most cases], the blood is collected from all slaughterings. The chances of having the blood of just one deceased piggy is pretty danged small. It's the blood of plural pigs. However, if one thinks of the word "pig" as referring to the animal generically as a group [The pig
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I vote for "pig's blood"--I couldn't find any shooting script back-up evidence (and I'm tempted to Tweet Jane E. about it... maybe someone other than me will). But if you were just referring to it without the possessive form, I think it would be "pig blood" like "cow blood" or "human blood". I just have trouble seeing the plural used when combining two nouns all Anglo-Saxon style.
Shark blood. Sharks blood. It sounds weird. Cow blood. Cows blood. Goat blood. Goats blood. The plural just doesn't look right to me.
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I could never quite decide whether it was "pig's blood" or "pigs' blood" - and now my editing course has informed me that, in fact, "pigs blood" would be perfectly alright. So I'm rather confused...
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I tend to think the Council views themselves as one entity. Quentin even implies that in how the Slayer dies, the Council remains. So I can see them looking at themselves so much as one body that they call themselves "the Watcher's Council". The great body as a whole is The Watcher. The individuals are watchers. I think it's an idiosyncrasy that relies upon self-determination of identity, not the rules of grammar per se.
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Actually, that's now making me flash back to the Buffy movie - with the Watcher who keeps getting reincarnated. So in every generation there's the Slayer and the Watcher, who are the same person, over and over again...
*ponders*
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"Lovers Walk," because that's what it says on my DVD, and I'm assuming they know what the title is supposed to be.
"Pig's blood," because it's blood that comes from a pig.
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*is confuzzled*
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I don't use a possessive in Lovers Walk
Watchers' Council has a plural.
I think...
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