Roberts, Sam. "Celebrating the Semicolon in a Most Unlikely Location", The New York Times, Feb 18, 2008. [NYT]
Macy, Beth. "Notice What You Notice", American Journalism Review, Aug/Sept 2008. [AJR]
New York Times urban affairs reporter Sam Roberts describes himself as somewhat shy, not apt to approach strangers on subways. Like many journalists, he's more likely to wander around looking for an irresistible, quirky nugget that's just waiting for some wide-eyed reporter to come along and claim it.
Roberts was on the subway one day in February when he noticed a New York City Transit public service placard reminding subway riders not to leave their newspapers behind.
"Please put it in a trash can; that's good news for everyone," the sign prompted.
A semicolon on a subway sign? Roberts chuckled at the novelty of it. Then he took another critical leap:
Roberts noticed that he noticed it.
Back at the office, he made a few calls — to writer Frank McCourt, to linguist Noam Chomsky, to Lynne Truss, the author of "Eats, Shoots & Leaves." The Google machine helped him turn up Famous Semicolon Wielders in History. Roberts even tracked down the erudite author of the subway prose and found, much to his delight, a civil servant with a sense of humor.
"I thought I'd be lucky if a few retired English teachers read it," Roberts says. But readers loved the story which became the most e-mailed Times story that week.
