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Topic : Post scriptum in my soft diary I write what happens to me every day as my diary. I don't write them on paper, but I typeset them in a word-processing system (soft diary), so I can simply - selfpublishingguru.com

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I write what happens to me every day as my diary. I don't write them on paper, but I typeset them in a word-processing system (soft diary), so I can simply edit them and add/remove anything at any time.

I know the application of post scriptum in letters which contains information that one wants to add to a letter after finishing it. But I'm wondering if writing post scriptum is technically sound after each entry of my diary. I doubt about it because I can edit an entry and add what I want to say to it without writing a post scriptum. However, editing needs some extra effort to find the right place in the entry for the insertion of that new piece of information. Additionally, sometimes I'd like to emphasize some important information, and post scriptum would be a good spot to put that information.

So, is it a good practice to have post scriptums in my diary in the way I described above?


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In the pre-digital days, post-scripts were used because you didn't want to have to rewrite out the entire letter again. But people still use them now, even in emails, sometimes, because they serve the functions of 1) establishing an internal chronology of "this first, then that" and 2) they set something aside as a separate thought, like a parenthetical.

Your diary is for yourself. You can establish any conventions you want for it. But as a record of your thoughts and experiences, it is probably more useful, for personal archival purposes, to use post scripts than to edit. If you were publishing, you would want to erase evidence of the process, and just have the final result. But for a personal archive, the post-scripting process gives valuable info about the progression of your thoughts.


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I would continue to use PS. Leave your diary as written, and if you add something, the PS tells you that you added it, after some thought, and if it were me that is worth knowing too:

PS the next day it occurred to me...
PS It took me a week to think of it, but John probably wasn't trying to be mean at all, ...
PS Reading over this I think I forgot one of the best parts ...

So your PS is not just "stylistic", but informative as well; reflecting how our minds and what we know and feel evolve with reflections on what happened.


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There is a discussion of the use of postscripts in email messages on English Language & Usage.

The discussion was closed as being primarily opinion based, but one thing to consider is that a postscript can be used as a deliberate style choice rather than just adding something at the end because you are unable to edit what you had written before.

For example, adding something brief and very much off topic at the end of a message in which the notation itself would not be appropriate.

One of the answers in that discussion is my own. I won't quote it here, but I'm somebody who has always used postscripts stylistically—never in the "too difficult to edit" context in which they originated.

I will make specific mention, however (as I did there), of Karen Hertzberg's blog post "What PS Means and How to Use It Correctly in Your Email". It expands on the idea of using postscripts stylistically.

But all of that aside, you can literally do whatever you want when writing your own diary entries.


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