St James'ses

James Wood's use of the possessive in 'David Shields's recent manifesto "Reality Hunger"' (here, final para) is just plain ugly. But 'Roland Barthes's prosecutorial ruthlessness' (three lines later) is a real mind-warper.

Either it counts as doubly hideous - implying, as it may, that we think 'Barthes' is actually pronounced 'Barths' or 'Bart(h)ez' - and/or a mutant result of obsessive adherence to 'house style'; or it demonstrates an assumption that every New Yorker-reader knows full well that you don't pronounce the 'es' on the end of 'Barthes'.

Anyone fancy odds?*

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*French-speakers do not apply.