History
Many writers, especially in informal writing, have used multiple punctuation marks to end a sentence expressing surprise and question.
What the...?! Neves, Called Dead in Fall, Denies It (headline from San Francisco Examiner, May 9, 1936)
The question mark frequently comes first, although there is no universal style rule on the subject.
Writers using informal language may use several alternating question marks and exclamation marks for even more emphasis:
He did what?!?!?!
Like multiple exclamation marks and multiple question marks, such strings count as poor style in formal writing.
Writers had combined question marks and exclamation marks (along with using multiple punctuation marks) for decades before the "invention" of the interrobang. They were prevalent in informal media such as print advertisements and comic books.
The combinations "!?" and "?!" are also used to express judgements of particular chess moves through their use as punctuation in chess annotation. "?!" denotes a "dubious" move, while "!?" denotes an "interesting" move.
Read more about this topic: Interrobang
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The reverence for the Scriptures is an element of civilization, for thus has the history of the world been preserved, and is preserved.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“We know only a single science, the science of history. One can look at history from two sides and divide it into the history of nature and the history of men. However, the two sides are not to be divided off; as long as men exist the history of nature and the history of men are mutually conditioned.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“All history attests that man has subjected woman to his will, used her as a means to promote his selfish gratification, to minister to his sensual pleasures, to be instrumental in promoting his comfort; but never has he desired to elevate her to that rank she was created to fill. He has done all he could to debase and enslave her mind; and now he looks triumphantly on the ruin he has wrought, and say, the being he has thus deeply injured is his inferior.”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)