Among the many epic poems written throughout history, Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey are two of the most beloved, having been translated countless times over the years. In 2018, British American classicist Emily Wilson became the first woman to publish an English translation of The Odyssey, bringing a fresh and contemporary voice to the millennia-old poem.Choice B is the best answer. The convention being tested is punctuation use between titles and proper nouns. Because the proper noun “Emily Wilson” is essential information identifying the title “classicist,” no punctuation is necessary.
Choice A: No punctuation is needed before or after the proper noun “Emily Wilson.” Setting the author’s name off with commas suggests that it could be removed without affecting the coherence of the sentence, which is not the case.
Choice C: No punctuation is needed after the proper noun “Emily Wilson” as it would separate it from the verb “became.”
Choice D: No punctuation is needed to separate the title “classicist” and the proper noun “Emily Wilson.”
✨ Expert's Tip ✨
- A description of a profession (such as “classicist”) should not be separated from the proper noun (such as “Emily Wilson”) by a comma. Unless the title is used as an appositive, no punctuation should come between them.
- No punctuation is needed between the subject and the verb if the former is immediately followed by the latter.