Few dialogue questions

[Ivonia]

When a character is thinking something, does it need to be italicized, or just write that they were thinking that ("So this is what happened" John thought to himself)?

How about radio transmissions? When a character is talking over the radio, do the replies need to be italicized?

For example:

"Get us out of here, now!" the commander shouted.

"We're trying, but the enemy is cutting off our routes to you!" the radio operator replied back.


OR

"Where is the air support?" Sergeant Baker yelled into the hand mic.

"We're facing heavy AA fire." the radio operator replied back, "We can't give you support until you knock those guns out!"

---------------

I'm guessing that the dialogue should be italicized? It does look cooler if nothing else, but I'm not sure what the "rule" is for talking over the phone/radio (when the other person talking isn't in the same scene/area).

[ChunkyC]

I'll take on the second part first. I don't believe radio replies need to be italicized. It's not an internal thought, it's someone speaking. However, if you want to make it obvious which person is speaking without having to resort to dialogue tags (radio guy said, etc.), then you probably could make a stylistic choice to use italics for the person being heard over the radio. Mind you, this then eliminates being able to use italics to denote thoughts, because it could confuse your readers. I think as long as you set up the scene so that the reader knows who's physically present and who is just a voice over a radio, you shouldn't need to use italics.

As for thoughts, I've seen it done both ways. I much prefer thoughts in italics. It's another case of being able to differentiate without resorting to dialogue tags.

[scarletpeaches]

If something is said out loud, it should be in quote marks. Thoughts can be stated without quote marks and then attributed, or italicized, but the 'replied back' thing would bother me more.

[Euan H.]

When a character is thinking something, does it need to be italicized, or just write that they were thinking that ("So this is what happened" John thought to himself)?
I've seen it done both ways: either italics or a thought tag. But AFAIK, you only use quote marks for speech; don't use them for thoughts.

To my mind, using italics instead of an attributor gets you closer into the mind of the viewpoint character--which may or may not be what you want to do in a given scene.

but I'm not sure what the "rule" is for talking over the phone/radio (when the other person talking isn't in the same scene/area).
I think the rule would just be: make it clear who's speaking. If you do that, then you'll be okay.

[TheIT]

The way I understand it, internal monologue is not italicized but an exact quote of a character's thoughts would be.

Example:

George knew he had blown the job interview despite all his preparation. He'd read all the right interview guides and done his research. Heck, he'd even shined his shoes. If only I hadn't spilled coffee down the interviewer's dress. Maybe he could get a job at a dry cleaners.

[LightShadow]

Is somebody responding to their thoughts? Thoughts, italics. Spoken, quotes. Internal dialogue, either. Nothing is set in stone, but industry standards are as they are. Sometimes thoughts aren't in words but mental actions, even. Oh, and talking to one's self is okay, says the therapist. It's when one responds that there is a problem.

[Ivonia]

Okay, I think I have it figured out now. One other question, what about, a recording? Would that be italicized or not?

Say a character finds a cassette tape by a dead body, and decides to play it back to see what they said before they died. Would that be italicized or just quoted?

[reph]

These weren't your questions, but I have answers.

"John thought to himself": If John can think to anyone but himself, he has a strange nervous system. Just say he thought.

"Replied back": Every reply is a reply back. A speaker simply replies, that's all.

[Vomaxx]

Definitely get rid of "replied back." Just "replied."

[Mistook]

Okay, I think I have it figured out now. One other question, what about, a recording? Would that be italicized or not?

Say a character finds a cassette tape by a dead body, and decides to play it back to see what they said before they died. Would that be italicized or just quoted?

Nothing is italicized except for thought. Any speech that can be heard with the ear, or read with the eye (as in a diary your character might find, or an IM session online) would be in quotes. Italics has nothing to do with presenting the sound quality of the human voice over a tape or a radio.

If you have to quote a long passage, you'd set it off by indenting the left and right margins so that the block is tighter than the regular narrative. If that long passage goes on for several paragraphs, you'd put a (") at the beginning of each paragraph, but you wouldn't close the quote at the end of every paragraph. You'd only have one closing quote at the very end of the block.

If you are presenting lyrics or poetry, which isn't punctuated the same as ordinary prose, and in which line breaks might be important to preserve, you'd set it off again with greater indentation. You have a little creative freedom to present lyrics or poems the way you see fit, as long as it's consistent throughout the book. But you shouldn't put them in italics.

The only other time italics is used, except for thought, is for single words that need emphasis. Instead of bolding or capsing an emphasized word, you'd put it in italics.

[Jamesaritchie]

Depending on the in-house rule, such things as letters or journal entries can also be italicized, instead of set off with indents. Italics are also often used for emphasis, and should be used for such things as titles and ship names. The carrier Ticonderoga, or The Random House Dictionary for example.

[Ivonia]

Depending on the in-house rule, such things as letters or journal entries can also be italicized, instead of set off with indents. Italics are also often used for emphasis, and should be used for such things as titles and ship names. The carrier Ticonderoga, or The Random House Dictionary for example.

Hmm, I have quite a few ships for the story I'm writing about. Should I also italicize the name of the fleet they belong to as well? Or just the specific ships?

[scarletpeaches]

Definitely get rid of "replied back." Just "replied."

I said that first! :D

[inexperiencedinker]

I am in the middle of the John Sandford Prey series and I just read a scene with hand radios. The author did use italics, but there were about 25 people on the hand radios. He used speech tags when he wanted to attribute a phrase to a specific person, but it seemed like the rest didn't matter who they were said by, just that they came from the radio. I think that is why he used italics, to differentiate. If you want, PM and I can reply with a page or so of the dialogue, so you can see what he was doing.

[Jamesaritchie]

Hmm, I have quite a few ships for the story I'm writing about. Should I also italicize the name of the fleet they belong to as well? Or just the specific ships?

No, just italicize the names of specific ships.

[Ray Dillon]

'Hmm ... how do I do it again?' Ray thought to himself.

"Oh, that's right, I use apostrophe's and italics," he said aloud."

An editor told me to try it and I liked the style of it. Makes it clear that it is thought and not regular dialogue. It could be bad to read a line of dialogue, thinking the character is saying it out loud, and then read, "he thought," at the end. That could confuse your senses.

[Jamesaritchie]

'Hmm ... how do I do it again?' Ray thought to himself.

"Oh, that's right, I use apostrophe's and italics," he said aloud."

An editor told me to try it and I liked the style of it. Makes it clear that it is thought and not regular dialogue. It could be bad to read a line of dialogue, thinking the character is saying it out loud, and then read, "he thought," at the end. That could confuse your senses.

As an editor, I'd remove the apostrophe marks. The lack of quotation marks let's the read know it isn't regular dialogue. No quotation marks, no speech aloud. I think every reader knows this. So do the words "Ray thought."

[scarletpeaches]

Plus, there's no apostrophe in apostrophes.

[Jamesaritchie]

Plus, there's no apostrophe in apostrophes.

My eyes went right over that without registering anything wrong. Good catch.

[reph]

Plus, there's no apostrophe in apostrophes.
I noticed that, and "thought to himself" (redundant), and "said aloud" (redundant). It occurred to me that these breaches might be a deliberate exercise of Ray's sense of humor.

[Jamesaritchie]

I noticed that, and "thought to himself" (redundant), and "said aloud" (redundant). It occurred to me that these breaches might be a deliberate exercise of Ray's sense of humor.

No doubt about it. I gotta get new batteries for my internal editor.

[spacejock2]

I use italics for radio, plain text if the dialogue is in person or through a visual medium. I generally build thoughts straight into the text without formatting. E.g.

Frowning at her reflection, she ran her fingers through her windswept hair and practised a winning smile or two. ‘Oh, Mr Spacejock, you’re so handsome!’ she squeaked, batting her eyelids. Stifling a laugh, she put the compact away and picked up the heavy briefcase. The bastard wouldn’t know what hit him.

I don't like 'replied', and never use it. If they're talking to each other, replied is implied.

I prefer to use a dialog beat: The operator raised his voice. The radio crackled. Something to clue the reader in without being too obvious.

[WVWriterGirl]

I have a hand-written letter in one of my newest works, and I italicized it because I wanted to give the impression of a quick, personal note; it's also indented to further off-set it. If I have to change it, I'll change it; if not, good deal. I like the way it makes the letter seem more personal, especially since the subject matter (of the letter) is so intense.

Is this wrong, then?

[spacejock2]

Is this wrong, then?

Nothing's wrong when you're the writer ;-)

Large slabs of italics can be hard to read, but I used exactly the same device in my current WIP. The epilogue is a hand-written note, in italics.

[Jamesaritchie]

I have a hand-written letter in one of my newest works, and I italicized it because I wanted to give the impression of a quick, personal note; it's also indented to further off-set it. If I have to change it, I'll change it; if not, good deal. I like the way it makes the letter seem more personal, especially since the subject matter (of the letter) is so intense.

Is this wrong, then?

No, there's nothing at all wrong with doing it your way. This really falls under "in-house rule," but most editors let the writer decide how to do something like a letter.

[aruna]

Speaking of italics.
Italics, in a copy-edited ms, are underlined; and it was right here on AW that I learned that in the ms they should be also underlined.
So I underlined all my italics.
One agent I sent my partial ms to kindly sent me his reader's detailed report; he/she commented: "Why are so many portions of this script underlined? It seems that these should be italicized instead" (or something like that).
Have I made a fool of myself, or is the reader just not savvy?

[reph]

Have I made a fool of myself, or is the reader just not savvy?
Choice B is correct.

[aruna]

Choice B is correct.

phew! That's a relief!

[Mistook]

Just to make things startlingly clear to anybody who is confused...

In traditional manuscript format - with double spaced, 12pt Courier, with 1" margins (check local listings for subtle variations on this format) - you do not actually italicize anything.

You denote what is meant to be taken as italics by underlining otherwise ordinary font.

I say this, just to cover that base where some new writer thinks he has to first italicize, and then underline everything that's been italicized. It seems silly, but I bet I would've wondered about that the first day I rolled into the castle, here at Hogwartz.

[spacejock2]

I mark all italics with an _underscore at the start and end_ of the italicised text.

This has the added benefit that clicking 'autoformat' in word will automatically convert text marked in this way to italics.

My editor and I both use word, and send doc files back and forth. The first thing she does is convert all the underscored sections to real italics.

Cheers
Simon

[Jamesaritchie]

Speaking of italics.
Italics, in a copy-edited ms, are underlined; and it was right here on AW that I learned that in the ms they should be also underlined.
So I underlined all my italics.
One agent I sent my partial ms to kindly sent me his reader's detailed report; he/she commented: "Why are so many portions of this script underlined? It seems that these should be italicized instead" (or something like that).
Have I made a fool of myself, or is the reader just not savvy?

Remeber that agents and their readers are not editors. Many of them don't know jack about proper manuscript format. The right way to do it is to underline anything you want italicized, no matter what an agent or an agent's reader says.

[Jamesaritchie]

I mark all italics with an _underscore at the start and end_ of the italicised text.

This has the added benefit that clicking 'autoformat' in word will automatically convert text marked in this way to italics.

My editor and I both use word, and send doc files back and forth. The first thing she does is convert all the underscored sections to real italics.

Cheers
Simon

This works with some editors, and not with others. At many publishers, the editor you work with is not the one who changes things from underline to italics. For most publishers, it's best to underline from front to back. Most novel manuscripts are still edited by hand, and paper manuscripts are swapped back and forth, not doc files.

[brinkett]

When you're submitting, make sure you read the guidelines. The default should be to underline, but some small presses want italics as italics, not underlined.

[aruna]

Remeber that agents and their readers are not editors. Many of them don't know jack about proper manuscript format. The right way to do it is to underline anything you want italicized, no matter what an agent or an agent's reader says.

That's what I thought; so I kept the underlines and assumed the reader just didn't know.

[batgirl]

One agent I sent my partial ms to kindly sent me his reader's detailed report; he/she commented: "Why are so many portions of this script underlined? It seems that these should be italicized instead" (or something like that).
Have I made a fool of myself, or is the reader just not savvy?
Aruna, excuse my asking, but who was the agent? I ask because, somewhere on the Bewares board, there is a mention of an agent (clueless rather than scam) who made a very similar comment on a manuscript. Something like "Lastly, what's with all the underlines? Thought should be in italics." It might have been Thoth Agency.
I don't mean to suggest that the agent is a scam or clueless, but that it might be a bit of a heads-up?
-Barbara

PS: Book titles as well as the names of ships, I think, are underlined/italics. Another use for underlining to indicate italics is quotations. In the book I co-wrote with a friend, because the characters are well-read and given to quotation, we tried to reserve underlining for quotations, and to write their thoughts so as to avoid underlining, so it wouldn't take over the page.

[lilmizflashythang]

The only time I've ever seen any thought italized was when it was telepathic comunication. I don't know if that's par for the course or not.

[The Lonely One]

I disagree with the notion that there is only one right way to offset dialog and thoughts.

You don't need quote marks or italics for either. If you've got clarity that's ALL, repeat, ALL you need. Also I've seen italics inside quote marks for emphasis of voice, so I don't know who said you couldn't do that but I'm fairly sure you can.

ex:

I told that squirrelly little jit, You look at her like that again and you'll be eating through a straw--jabbed through your neck.

or

"I'm about to make your life shit."

Also thought can be italicized or not. It really doesn't matter so long as it's clear.

ex:

Jim took another step. I'm doing it. I'm really doing it.

There's no tag, no italics, yet it's clear as day who's thinking, because the sudden transition to first person and the juxtaposition to Jim, as well as the thought's relation to whatever he's doing (stepping, apparently).

So, just wanted to present the possibility that there are different ways to go about this.