lead role in a cage

Taking the marks we have examined so far, is there any art involved in using the apostrophe? No. Using the apostrophe correctly is a mere negative proof; it tells the world you are not a thicko. The comma, while less subject to universal rules, is still a utilitarian mark, racing about with its ears back, trying to serve both the sense and the sound of the sentence -- and of course wearing itself to a frazzle for a modest bowl of Chum. Using the comma well announces that you have an ear for sense and rhythm, confidence in your style and proper respect for your reader, but it does not mark you out as master of your craft.

But colons and semicolons -- well, they are in a different league, my dear! They give such lift! Assuming a sentence rises into the air with the initial capital letter and lands with a softish bump at the full stop, the humble comma can keep the sentence aloft all right, like this, UP, for hours if necessary, UP, like this, UP, sort-of bouncing, UP, and then falling down, and then UP it goes again, assuming you have enough additional things to say, although in the end you may run out of ideas and then you have to roll along the ground with no commas at all until some sort of surface resistance takes over and you run out of steam anyway and then with the help of three dots ... you stop. But the thermals that benignly waft our sentences to new altitudes -- that allow us to coast on air, and loop-the-loop, suspending the laws of gravity -- well, they are the colons and semi-colons. If you don't believe me, ask Virginia Woolf.

Eats, Shoots and Leaves:
The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation
Lynne Truss