: Re: Specific use of apostrophe at the beginning of a sentence This is a highly specific scenario for which I haven't been able to find a concrete answer. When you write the contraction 'Tis (It

@Smith147

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So first of all, you are correct that there are multiple types of apostrophes. In some typefaces, and in Unicode/UTF-8, there are two types of apostrophes.

The typesetter's apostrophe (’), which is the "curly" one.
The typewriter's apostrophe ('), which is the "straight" one.

To quote Wikipedia's decision on this matter:

According to Unicode, the apostrophe is the same character as the closing single quotation mark, although the semantics of this character are "context-dependent". (When it functions as a closing quotation mark, it is always paired with an opening quotation mark.) Other substitutes such as ´ (acute accent) and ‘ (opening single quotation mark) are common due to ambiguous treatment of the apostrophe in early digital typesetting (as explained below). In informal contexts, the simple typewriter apostrophe ' is commonly substituted for any of a variety of similar marks and their formal purposes.

In informal contexts, the default apostrophe is that flat typewriter's apostrophe. The only situation in which the left-and-right-curling typesetter's apostrophes are used are in opening and closing dialogue. Otherwise, use the flat typewriter's apostrophe.
So, to answer your specific questions:

Words like "'Tis" should always use the flat typewriter's apostrophe.
When you have "'Tis" in between opening and closing dialogue quotations, you would use the curly left opening apostrophe and the curly right closing apostrophe for the dialogue marks, and the flat typewriter's apostrophe for "'Tis" itself.

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