‘Lady Day,’ it said in the New Oxford Style Manual (one of ‘the world’s most trusted reference books’, as it said on the jacket), ‘25 May, the feast of the Annunciation.’ Well, it is the Annunciation, but it isn’t in May but March. Of course, one does not look up ‘Lady Day’ in the New Oxford Style Manual to find out what it is, but whether to use capital letters, perhaps. But even so…
The odd thing about this mistake in one of ‘the world’s most trusted reference books’ is that it has languished there since 2005, when it was last revised. You’d think someone would have told them. Perhaps someone did and they lost the message.
The New Oxford Style Manual, out this week (£25), is composed of two books: New Hart’s Rules and the New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors (Nodwe).
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