The so-called Numidian, a ragtag band of Tatler rejects that has taken to naming itself after an extinct species of lion, which is itself named for an extinct North African kingdom, has once again published a long series of mistakes under the guise of a yearbook. This cadre of generally unsuccessful students has made its ignorance clear through affronts to Lakesiders, the world, and language itself. Tatler, in its benevolence, has given last year’s Numidian a thorough copyediting; Numidian, take notes.
On page 1, “Light Rail” is capitalized despite not being a proper noun.
On the same page, the publication’s very own name is not italicized.
In a third mistake on the very first page, an en dash is used instead of an em dash, and with a space after it but not before. Though manuals of style may disagree on whether to surround an em dash with spaces, this construction is decidedly and nonstandardly lopsided.
On page 6, “Mountaineering Trip” is capitalized despite not being a proper noun.
On page 7, the word “and” is absent from a list of students’ names.
On page 8, “Freshman Class of 2028” is capitalized mid-sentence, even though “freshman” cannot be considered part of a proper noun.
On page 9, “middle school” is written in lowercase, whereas the Lakeside standard is “Middle School.”
Also on page 9, “Convocation” is capitalized mid-sentence, whereas the word is a common noun and presented in lowercase by official communications.
In a third mistake on page 9, the word “listed” is used instead of “listened.”
For the fourth mistake on page 9, two different forms of apostrophe are used within the article: one that curls toward the graduation year of Rohan D. ’25 and another that does not point in any direction.
As a fifth mistake on page 9, “Head of school” is written in lowercase before Dr. Bynum’s name, despite the title typically being capitalized when preceding a person’s name.
In a sixth mistake on page 9, an unnecessary comma is used between the words “collaboration” and “before.”
On page 12, no comma is present between the words “year” and “and,” whereas one would be expected before that coordinating conjunction.
Still on page 12, a reference to “Spider Man” lacks the hyphen found in the character’s official and widely accepted name.
On page 13, “Girls Soccer” is capitalized despite not being a proper noun: “The girls soccer team” would be more appropriate.
On page 13, the Spirit Couch is referred to erroneously as the “StudGov Couch,” which is especially incorrect considering that Student Government abbreviates its name as “Stud Gov.”
On page 14, “Haunted Houses” is capitalized despite not being a proper noun.
On pages 14 and 15, “Halloween Assembly” is capitalized despite only being a combination of the proper noun “Halloween” and the common noun “assembly.”
On page 16, “Tug of War” is capitalized despite being a common noun. Although Merriam-Webster, the preferred dictionary of the Associated Press Stylebook and the Chicago Manual of Style, recommends that the term also be hyphenated, Tatler will, in its boundless generosity, disregard this glaring error.
On page 17, “photobooth” is written as one word despite almost always being rendered as two, including by professional photo booth companies. The device is, after all, a booth that captures photos.
On page 20, the word “and” is nowhere to be found between the names of Tessa N. ’28 and Audrey C. ’28.
On page 20, two spaces rather than one are used within a caption in the bottom left corner.
On page 22, the phrase “Senior-Run-Through” is hyphenated. This run-through conducted by seniors would more aptly be called the “Senior Run-Through,” with a space.
Also on page 22, the phrase “Senior Spring” is capitalized despite not being a proper noun.
On page 25, a caption states that three students “preform a dramatic skit.” This is a misspelling of “perform,” as to preform is to shape something in advance.
On page 26, the full surname of Indigo R. ’26, which Tatler cannot print due to its genuine concern for students’ privacy, appears in a roster where other last names are reduced to initials.
On page 27, a caption reading “The Fates” is italicized for no apparent reason. This creates confusion among the other non-italicized captions, as it leads a reader to assume that “The Fates” is a song or other work that must be capitalized.
On page 29, a hyphen is used rather than an em dash to attribute a quote from former Tatler copyeditor Nara Chen ’25.
Still on page 29, the blurb ungrammatically states that the school year “brought with it in” the transition to SAGE Dining Services.
On page 29 once more, SAGE’s name is written in lowercase, as “Sage Dining Services,” despite its official website stating otherwise.
In a fourth mistake on page 29, the word “Vegetarian” is capitalized erroneously as though it were a nationality. I have never been to Vegetaria, but the Numidian staff evidently have.
The fifth mistake on page 29 tells of a “build-your own bar” offered by SAGE, with only “build” and “your” — not also “your” and “own” — being hyphenated. What is an “own bar,” and how can it be “build-your” in nature?
The sixth mistake on page 29 captions an image with “The Sage Staff” in all caps, even though “staff” is not a proper noun.
On page 30, “Winter Concert” is capitalized despite being only a generic description of the concert’s season and being rendered in lowercase by members of the arts department.
A caption on page 31 reads, “Jazz Band prepares for their performance!” However, the image also depicts members of the Upper School and Middle School concert bands.
On page 32, a blurb does not capitalize the name of the Advanced Photography elective.
Within the very same blurb on page 32, the phrase “students takes” demonstrates improper subject-verb agreement.
On page 36, a space is used only after, but not before, the ellipsis between the words “everything” and “from.” Such a lopsided construction is frowned upon by the Chicago Manual of Style, the Modern Language Association, the Associated Press Stylebook, Robert Bringhurst’s The Elements of Typographic Style, and the Oxford Style Guide. Only the Oxford University Style Guide, a separate manual which is specific to that institution’s publications and prescribes British English conventions, begs to differ. All of this aside, an ellipsis is redundant in this sentence and serves only to confuse the reader.
Also on page 36, the last initial of student Liz E. ’26 is not provided before her graduation year.
On page 36 once more, the first name of Aanika T. ’25 is rendered as “Annika.”
Still on page 36, the name of the Senior Sunrise is not preceded by the article “the.”
On page 37, a blurb describes how two freshmen “head to retreat” without using the article “the.” This sentence would be ungrammatical even if “retreat” were in fact a verb, as “head to” cannot be used before a verb. Numidian has no escape from its ungrammaticality.
Also on page 37, a caption reads, “Freshman lay on the field between classes!” The correct plural would be “freshmen.”
Still on page 37, the definite article “the” is missing in the phrase “at senior retreat.”
On page 38, the comma before the conjunction “while” is unnecessary unless contrasting the clauses in the manner of “whereas,” which this sentence does not do.
Also on page 38, hyphens are used thrice for quote attribution where em dashes would be preferable.
Continuing with page 38, the first name of student Maisy S. ’28 is misspelled as “Maisie.” This is a particularly egregious error, considering that the most essential purpose of a yearbook is to list the correct names of students.
Still on page 38, the initials of author R. F. Kuang are presented without spaces or periods despite the writer’s preference.
On page 39, the name of the popular singer and songwriter is spelled “Charli XCX,” even though the musician prefers the last three letters to be lowercase.
Additionally, on page 39, a caption omits quotation marks around the name of the “Sweat” concert tour, even as other references to such tours on the very same page use quotes. The tour’s name also appears to usually be written in lowercase outside of marketing material.
On page 41, a question asks about the best time “to hangout with friends,” even though the verb form of the word for spending time with others should be two words: “hang out.”
On page 44, a blurb tells of “Club Fair,” even as both official Stud Gov emails and the title of this page refer to the event as “Clubs Fair.”
Also on page 44, the name of a Lakeside senior is rendered as “Ahan D.-C. ’26” despite no hyphen being present in his surname. This could be ascertained by asking Ahan, as Tatler has, or by looking at his name for one second. Worse yet, this contradicts the non-hyphenated convention used on page 14.
Continuing on page 44, a caption describes “math club” in lowercase, even though the club capitalizes its name and the names of other clubs are also capitalized on the same page.
On page 48, the phrase “side steps” is used instead of the verb “sidesteps.”
On page 51, hyphens are used instead of em dashes to attribute quotes from two students, and their application is inconsistent between the two quotations.
Also on page 51, an insight from a then-sophomore is attributed to “Sabine H-SK. ’27,” with the initial “S” inserted out of thin air. Sabine, who accepts either “H-K.” or simply “H.” as initials, called Numidian’s mistake “kind of an impressive error to make.”
On page 56, the names of Will A. ’25, Yitbarek M. ’28, and Grant M. ’27 are written without periods after the students’ last initials.
Also on page 56, the first name of Michael W. ’27 is spelled as “Micheal.”
Again, on page 56, there are two spaces rather than one between the last initial and graduation year of Connor C. ’25.
On page 64, a caption refers to Kellan W. ’25 as “Kellen.”
On page 65, the apostrophe before the graduation year of Taimur G. ’27 is straight, not curly, unlike the other apostrophes within the rosters on that page. Even more confusingly, this page is practically the only one to use curly apostrophes at all.
Still on page 65, there is no space between the last initials and graduation years of Remy L. ’27, Brandon L. ’27, and Aadi M. ’28.
On page 67, a caption reads, “Varsity Girls celebrate after winning a point!” Here, “Varsity Girls” should not be capitalized and would benefit from being preceded by the article “the.”
On page 68, the verb “high fives” is written without a hyphen.
On page 74, the name of former student Rahamatou M.-D. ’25 is listed without any periods as “Rahamatou M-D ’25.”
On page 86, the name of Wayland M.-F. ’26 is written as “Wayland M. ’26,” completely omitting one of his initials.
On page 88, a caption praises the boys crew team for “thier amazing feathering skills.” Aside from the improbable misspelling of “their,” the sentence’s tone is also oddly condescending, as its contrived positivity is like praising a footballer’s amazing running skills.
On pages 88 and 89, periods are inexplicably missing after the last initials of all six crew captains.
On page 89, the Head of the Lake regatta’s name is capitalized incorrectly as “Head of The Lake.”
On page 90, curly apostrophes are used to abbreviate graduation years in a roster, which is inconsistent with the rest of that page and elsewhere in the yearbook.
Additionally, on page 90, a caption reads, “Crystal L. 28′ intercepts.” The apostrophe should go before the number 28, as it indicates the omission of digits from the graduation year and Crystal will graduate in less than 800 years.
Still on page 90, “Captain Corner” is written without a possessive, inconsistent with the “Captain’s Corner” sections found in the other sports’ pages.
On page 97, the first name of faculty member CJ Jatabarry is rendered as “Cj.”
On page 120, the first name of Rani J. ’26, then a junior, is spelled “Rani`,” with a backtick or grave accent — that key under “escape” on your keyboard — at the end. How this improbable error entered Numidian’s pages is beyond even me, as one would have imagined that listing people’s names next to their portraits would be an extremely straightforward process.
On page 165, the word “doppelgangers” is misspelled as “dopplegangers.”
These mistakes are not esoteric. They are neither the arcane whims of style guide editors nor obscure grammatical rules, and most could be solved with a perfunctory Google search or a few seconds’ hindsight. Every tiny error adds up until it is impossible to peruse any page of content without catching sight of needless capitalization or a misplaced hyphen. Beyond obstructing readers’ flow, bad copyediting hinders a community’s trust in their publications.
Do better, Numidian.
