When to use italics

efreysson said:

My new manuscript includes quite a lot of bars, song titles and newspapers. Should I italicise all of them? None? Some?

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Check out the Chicago Manual of Style.

Song titles and newspapers, yes. Bars, no.

Google helps nicely there too if CMS is out of reach.

Not individual song titles.. Those are customarily rendered in quotation marks, as are the titles of short stories (e.g., "The Long and Winding Road", by the Beatles. A full-length book title is italicized, as would be the title of a music album (e.g., Abbey Road, by the Beatles), or a movie or a TV series.

Also customarily italicized are the names of ships (e.g., HMS Irrelevant).

And it is standard practice to use italics for emphasis; just don't overdo that.

Purdue OWL is also a good reference for such things.

caw

efreysson said:

One more question related to the topic: Stories. That is, folk tales. Should Little Red Riding Hood and the like be italicised?

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No. As others have said, book titles are italicized and short stories are in quotes:

Grimms' Fairy Tales, an English version of the book by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, contain "Hansel and Gretel," "Snow White," "Little Red Cap," and other stories.

Here's an article on Beth Hill's the editorsblog. Link

It's an extensive list of examples with explanations too!

The whole site is super helpful!