(exclamation mark) lets you type the inverted exclamation (¡). (question mark) allows you to key in the inverted question mark (¿) and the interrobang (‽), which is like a very excited ...

Several writers and inventors in the last century tried to introduce new marks of punctuation into the English language – but they all failed. Keith Houston tells their story.

You can already type an exclamation point, but can you find the inverted question mark or em dash? Learn how to type those and more with a phone keyboard.

According to Keith Houston, author of Shady Characters, it was British philosopher John Wilkins who first suggested an irony mark, which he thought should be an inverted exclamation point.

Word, word, word, word, word, punctuation mark. This is how we read. Sometimes there are more words, or fewer. Occasionally additional marks—commas, em-dashes—enter the mix. But that’s ...

Several writers and inventors in the last century tried to introduce new marks of punctuation into the English language – but they all failed. Keith Houston tells their story.