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I wanted to send a reading list to my dad about the state of the economy. One such commentator is known by the nickname "Dr. Doom". I went to write:

  • "Dr. Doom's" view is ... but that didn't look right because his name is Dr. Doom, not Dr. Doom's, so I tried
  • "Dr. Doom"'s view is ... but that looked pretty terrible because I have three apostrophes in a row making it look like some crazy emoticon or something.

This might not have a solution. My question is how to correctly use "double quotes" around "nouns" that are in the "possessive form"?

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  • The question mark should go outside the quotes. Why are you quoting Dr. Doom's name?
    – Matt E. Эллен
    Oct 23, 2013 at 11:27
  • Good question. I'm quoting it because it's not his real name, it's his kind of funny nickname. His real name is Marc Faber
    – user54741
    Oct 23, 2013 at 11:29
  • If you use quotation marks like “ and ” instead of ", they might look less like apostrophes to the reader.
    – user28567
    Oct 23, 2013 at 12:52
  • @MattЭллен End-punctuation inside/outside closing quotes is a matter of style and differs.
    – Kris
    Oct 23, 2013 at 14:34
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    "Dr. Doom's" is fine, is unambiguous, and most editors will pass it. If you are not constrained by a particular style guide, this would be your best bet. That's not a rule though, only a helpful tip, so this is a comment, not an answer.
    – Kris
    Oct 23, 2013 at 14:36

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The better question is, why are you putting the nickname in quotes at all? It is appropriate to do so the first time that you introduce a nickname, but subsequent uses do not require the quotes, and it clutters the story to use them every time. Do something like this:

An unknown economist writing as "Dr. Doom" has chimed in. Dr. Doom's view is that...

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