Question

read the sentence.
jesse felt irritable overwhelmed and frustrated as he entered the building.
according to the elements of style, what is the correct way to punctuate this sentence?
jesse felt irritable overwhelmed, and frustrated as he entered the building.
jesse felt irritable, overwhelmed, and frustrated as he entered the building.
jesse felt irritable, overwhelmed and frustrated as he entered the building.
no change

Explanation:

To determine the correct punctuation, we refer to "The Elements of Style" which states that when listing three or more coordinate adjectives (or words) in a series, commas should separate each item, including before the "and" (Oxford comma). Here, "irritable", "overwhelmed", and "frustrated" are coordinate adjectives describing how Jesse felt. So we need commas after "irritable", after "overwhelmed", and before "and".

Answer:

B. Jesse felt irritable, overwhelmed, and frustrated as he entered the building.