The King is dead. Long live the King! (2024)

Posted by: Josef Essberger

I received the following question from Jeanette about using capitals: “I am a writer and always have problems with the following: ‘The king is dead. Long live King Edward.’ ‘She told me Captain Lorca read the book. The captain could read.’ I am referring to the same king in the first sentence, and to the […]

I received the following question from Jeanette about using capitals:

“I am a writer and always have problems with the following:
‘The king is dead. Long live King Edward.’
‘She told me Captain Lorca read the book. The captain could read.’
I am referring to the same king in the first sentence, and to the same captain in the second. Why wouldn’t both be capitalized? Thanks for your help. I have no rule to follow with this problem.”

It’s a good question, with (quite) a simple answer.

In the case of “King Edward” and “Captain Lorca” we are using a person’s name. As you know, names in English are always capitalized. We write Edward, not edward. We write Lorca, not lorca.

When we also use a title with a name, we capitalize the title too. So we write King Edward, not king Edward. We write Captain Lorca, not captain Lorca.

But when we use the title just as a common noun, there is usually no need to capitalize it.

My taxi-driver could speak English
The waitress was tall.
Our doctor is nice.
The pilot spoke to the passengers.
Do you know the president?
The captain could read.

Just occasionally we may use an initial capital to show respect for a specific person with a very high title such as king or president. Usually this is when there is only one such personage (in a country, or perhaps in a company or ship). When we do this everybody knows exactly who we are talking about – it is like using the person’s name. Look at these examples, which show specific titles (capitalized) and non-specific titles:

The Prime Minister met the King last night.
Who is the King’s doctor?
The doctor prescribed some medicine.
There are many presidents in the world.
He is the president of this company.
The President wants to see you now.
Who will be the next president?
Who is the king of this country?
What is the King’s name?
The Titanic sank in the Atlantic. The Captain went down with the ship.
President Hu Jintao is General Secretary of the Communist Party of China.

This is also a question of style, and some writers might capitalize when others might not. When we are writing about a title or titles in general there is almost always no need to capitalize. Almost all writers would agree on the following examples:

Would you like to be a king?
Yesterday I met two kings and a president.
There were some kings at the meeting.
Each ship has a captain.
This hospital has twenty doctors.

So Jeanette is perfectly correct to write “The king is dead. Long live King Edward.” And the title of this post is also correct “The King is dead. Long live the King!”)

The important thing to remember is that when you use a title + name, they must both be capitalized

Queen Elizabeth
President Obama

Dear friends,
My name is Nasser and i live in Netherlands.
I would like to improve my writing skills and get correspond with native speaker. I have a dream to write my own story in English one day.
I genuinely inspired by this website.
I have already tried to get contact with native speaker, but I don,t seem to be able to get through with them. I hope I can finally find some natie English speaker.
Do you have any clue?
How can I improve my writing skills.
Kind regards,
Nasser

twfeeq says:

Writing correctly is not an easy things, It is ruled thing. I used to write and to read comments here but I afraid that some of writers have written their comments with lot of mistakes, It may be has a negative influence on others writings, I wish if we have here a correction tools look after this mistakes not for spelling rules only but for grammar’s mistakes also.

than quoc hiep says:

hi …every one !
i’m from vietnamese.now i’m a student .the major to learning for me very need English languese after go out school.so then i’ll joined in the club.i’ll to do anything to improve ENGLISH skill but not success.i’m hope that the club is helping me .special speaking and written skill
thank you ! have a nice day !

Robin says:

Thanks for EC Website and Josef Essberger..
I was so glad to come here..
Let’s study together..

Best Regards
Robin Guo

ly says:

thank you very much! it is useful for me.

yona says says:

it’s a good lesson
thanks

Ahsan says:

Its really an intresting lesson and i hope it will help me in improving my writing skills.

thanks

manjula prasad says:

i am learning english but i have no know teachers so i try to do my best in this web side.i think i can learn very well without teachers .i can do what i want .this the good way.i belive

amine says:

hi everyone, im samir , im from morocco , im taking english classes in hcc florida. Im a new comer here,and im looking for friends, from all over the world to speak english…. good luck everyone. my skype is: samir_bendriss

agyo says:

i don’t think about this story

awea says:

thx, good lesson

vizimax says:

thumbs upppp

🙂

farah jama says:

Hi, today is my second time in this site and Iam really encouraging my fried’s sugestion saying ,” hey let’s talk together and I think he or he means by onle sorry my ugly hand writing.

David Toan says:

Hi! Every one.

Zeidan Banat says:

Thank you so much for this lesson. It is so benfefitial for students. I hope you give some kind of advice of how to teach writing for secondary students.
Thanks in advance

potato says:

internet is so wonderful to learn english , thank EC

yusanjan says:

it si really good lesson for me

Thank you

Imtiyaz says:

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Dimitar says:

Hallo!
I wish to communicate online with a intermediate learner to improve our language together!
My skype is mitko1752
Thank you in advance. 🙂

farh jama says:

Hi, I ama a new comer, and I really need help to write good English.
Everytime, I try to write something my teacher returned me and said please go back you home-work and correct you mistakes. Although , Iam not good in writng and you can see how bad my writeing is ,I would like to do something better.Please help me becasue I need you help.

noha says:

Hi, how you all????
I am New member in English club. I’m 25 years. Am from Saudi Arabia, but now I am studing English language in United state in Boston. I want to speak English with your help And therefore participated in the englishclub 🙂

Anne says:

I actually didn’t know exactly when you write capitals or not.

Very helpfull lesson.

The King is dead. Long live the King! (2024)

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