: Re: Space Between Stanzas: Line Breaks or Paragraph Style? Nearly all the information I can find about Standard Manuscript Format for poetry is described in terms of the visual appearance of the

For those of us who write and publish poetry this is a serious question. I came looking for 'what do people usually do' because I'm trying to set up a poetry book manuscript in Scrivener. 'Ask your publisher' is a good answer if you have one lined up!

I agree with Fortiter that it makes more sense to make each stanza a paragraph and use paragraph spacing to separate them. I used to do it that way -- but I found that sometimes my stanza breaks got lost in translation, especially on web magazines, so I have gone back to making each line a paragraph and indicating stanza breaks by blank lines, because that, clumsy as it is, makes it absolutely clear what's going on. It's worth remembering that much poetry publishing is done by amateurs with limited typesetting skills.

Another difficulty is that if there are really long lines that create a turnover (ie, wrap onto the following line -- think Walt Whitman!) you will probably want hanging indents for just those lines. The easiest way to to do that is to make the line a paragraph so you can manipulate the left indent and first-line indent.

Load Full (0)

: Generally would an onomatopoeia come before or after the source action is implied I have a section which uses an onomatopoeia but I can write it in 2 ways The onomatopoeia before source action

@Jessie137

Load Full 1 Comments

: How do you write 2 or more characters saying almost the same thing in unison When 2 or more characters speak in unison you can generally do something like this "awwwww, she's so cute!"

@Jessie137

Load Full 5 Comments

: How to Write a Bullying Scene? In my newest story, the protagonist gets bullied constantly, and I'm planning for him to be driven to suicide later on the the story. But, I'm completely stuck

@Jessie137

Load Full 1 Comments

: Language specific rhetorical devices and their influence on non-English native writers NOTE: I've heavily rephrased the original question in a last attempt to clarify it. Background to the question

: Re: Space Between Stanzas: Line Breaks or Paragraph Style? Nearly all the information I can find about Standard Manuscript Format for poetry is described in terms of the visual appearance of the

More posts by @Jessie137

: Generally would an onomatopoeia come before or after the source action is implied I have a section which uses an onomatopoeia but I can write it in 2 ways The onomatopoeia before source action

: How do you write 2 or more characters saying almost the same thing in unison When 2 or more characters speak in unison you can generally do something like this "awwwww, she's so cute!"

: How to Write a Bullying Scene? In my newest story, the protagonist gets bullied constantly, and I'm planning for him to be driven to suicide later on the the story. But, I'm completely stuck

: Language specific rhetorical devices and their influence on non-English native writers NOTE: I've heavily rephrased the original question in a last attempt to clarify it. Background to the question

Login to post a comment!

0 Comments

Back to top