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STYLE POINTS FOR CONTRIBUTORS
Please append a brief note to your contribution for the journal section ‘Notes on Contributors’.
Use - ise endings where available (realise, recognise)
Use an en rule – with space either side – for parenthetical dashes
Use single quote marks throughout; double only for ‘quotes “within” quotes’
At the end of a sentence use a single space following a sentence point (full stop/period) rather than two. Similarly use a single space after : or ;
For an ellipsis (…) use a single character (Ctrl+Alt+. in MS Word) with one space before and after the ellipsis if the sentence continues. The ellipsis should follow a point if ending a sentence.…
Typographic style and layout can be left to the Editor. Contributors should use a plain typeface for their article in its entirety, including quotations.
relative placing of quotation marks and punctuation
Signs of punctuation used with words within quotation marks should be placed according to the sense. When there is one quotation within another, and both end with the sentence, put the punctuation mark before the first of the closing quotation marks. But sentence points should not invariably be placed within the quotation mark at the end of an extract: We need not ‘follow a multitude to do evil’.
When a long sentence is quoted, introduced by quite a short phrase, the closing point should be placed at the end of the quoted sentence: Jesus said, ‘Do not think that I have come to annul the Law and the Prophets; I have come to fulfil them.’
acronyms/abbreviations:
In general don’t use points: BBC, RADA, RSC, TLS, UK, USA
exceptions: A.D., B.C., M.P., St., Dr., Mr., Mrs.
hyphenation:
eighteenth century verse
historically minded, sincerely held
late Victorian
no-one
postcolonial
postmodern
post-structuralist
possessives: add ’s except in Classical names: Dickens’s, but Ulysses’, Alcibiades’
capitalisation:
Romantics
Western (cap. when a political concept; l.c. if geographical)
Quotations
Prose:
In general, only display prose quotations of over c. 40 words. The first line should only be indented if a new paragraph begins in the original; otherwise, begin full left.
Avoid using ellipses at the start of quotes (whether displayed or run on in the text): it can be assumed that a prose quote isn’t taken from the very start of a work.
Poetry:
Any length of quotation can be displayed, though if a lot of short quotations are given consider whether they may be better run on in the text. In run-on quotes, indicate line divisions with a solidus / with space either side.
Reference/Notes
Use references sparingly. At first citation give full details in a note (see templates below). If it’s available use the Insert Footnote feature in MS Word (with Arabic number format) to create a linked reference. The superscript number for a footnote follows the punctuation or quotation mark.
Give place (town) of publication if it isn’t London, or evident, e.g. Cambridge University Press does not need a preliminary ‘Cambridge’.
Subsequent references to frequently cited works should be given in parentheses in the text. Avoid using a bare number: (p. 99) (l. 300) not (99) (300).
Reviews: avoid footnotes, occasional essential page references should be within the text.
Templates
Books
Zachary Leader (ed.), On Modern British Fiction, OUP, 2002, p. 123.
Chapters in edited books:
David Riede, ‘Transgression, Authority, and the Church of Literature in Carlyle’, in Jerome J. McGann (ed.), Victorian Connections, Charlottesville, Va., 1989, pp. 99-130. Commas rather than parenthesis for the place of publication.
Editions of works:
The George Eliot Letters, ed. Gordon S. Haight, 9 vols., New Haven, 1954-78, ii. 126.
If you are quoting from an edition other than the first, the original year of publication may be given in square parentheses: J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings [1966], 1983.
Journal articles (spell out journal titles in full):
Janice L. Haney, ‘“Shadow-Hunting”: Romantic Irony, Sartor Resartus and Victorian Romanticism’, Studies in Romanticism, 17 (1978), 300-30: 327.
A-Z
A.D. (not C.E.)
age: 30 years old
analyse (not -yze)
B.C. (not B.C.E.)
BBC
Bible
Biblical
bishop of Ely, but Bishop Patrick
Chaucer: Canterbury Tales, VII. 99; individual tales roman: Monk’s Tale
date: 22 July 2006
dénouement
the devil
duke of Northumberland
earl of Leicester
eighteenth century (not 18th)
eighteenth century verse (no hyphen)
enquiry (not in-)
focusing
Gospel (message), gospel (the genre, four gospels), but the Gospel of Matthew (title)
historically minded, sincerely held (no hyphen)
in so far (three words)
judgement (e)
late Victorian
M.P.
no-one (hyphen)
numbers: spell out up to 100 except ages (30 years old), percentages (30 per cent), and statistical passages generally
offstage
onstage
paralyse (not -yze)
per cent: 30 per cent
play text
play-goer
possessives: add ’s except in Classical ‘-es’ names: Dickens’s, Apemantus’s, but Ulysses’, Alcibiades’
postcolonial
postmodern, modernism, modernist
post-structural.
Adapted from Essays in Criticism’s Style Notes http://www.oxfordjournals.org/escrit/for_authors/index.html
and from R.M. Ritter, The Oxford Guide to Style, OUP, 2002.
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