Formatting text(s)

[Inkhorn]

To the best of my knowledge, the world of modern English hasn’t settled on any one rule when it comes to writing out text messages or internet chat logs in prose. There is no specific punctuation or grammatical rules for it, is there?

How do you as an author go about it? What formatting works best and looks acceptable to your eye when writing out a story? Do you keep the text attached to the related paragraph as you would with a regular conversation? Or do you break it out separately to stand out?

 

[NotWise]

To the best of my knowledge, the world of modern English hasn’t settled on any one rule when it comes to writing out text messages or internet chat logs in prose. There is no specific punctuation or grammatical rules for it, is there?

How do you as an author go about it? What formatting works best and looks acceptable to your eye when writing out a story? Do you keep the text attached to the related paragraph as you would with a regular conversation? Or do you break it out separately to stand out?

I treat it like any other dialogue. I may used "messaged" or "texted" as a dialogue tag, but not often.

 

[SimonDoom]

Same as Notwise. I write it like it's dialogue, with quotation marks, but use "texted" or something similar in place of "said."

I'm a minimalist when it comes to formatting, generally. I don't use bold or italics. I don't find it's necessary when I read and it's simpler when I write to avoid it.

I think the only real rules to follow with this sort of thing are to keep it simple, to be consistent, and to make sure it's clear who's speaking/texting/writing.

 

[Inkhorn]

Here is an older thread about that: Texting in a fictional story.

Thank you!

 

[8letters]

Personally, I only use double quotes for actual dialog. When I read stuff, my first thought when I read something in double quotes is that it is dialog, so I write accordingly. In my current story, I put texts into italics.

 

[KeithD]

To the best of my knowledge, the world of modern English hasn’t settled on any one rule when it comes to writing out text messages or internet chat logs in prose. There is no specific punctuation or grammatical rules for it, is there?

No it hasn't. It's been slow in providing any help.

 

[ThisNameIsntTakenYet]

I agree with NotWise and Simon. I also write it the same as actual dialogue, because in my mind it is. To me it doesn't matter if it's spoken in person, over the phone, text/chat messages or even through notes passed back and forth. As long as it counts as a real-time conversation I write it like one, regardless of medium.

 

[KeithD]

Personally, I only use double quotes for actual dialog. When I read stuff, my first thought when I read something in double quotes is that it is dialog, so I write accordingly. In my current story, I put texts into italics.

I doubt that you really do. What do you do with a poem or song title or a word you are using in doubt? They should, in American style, be in double quotes. Quotes are used for more than dialogue, and the American system is always double quotes at the first level. (This differs from the British system.)

Until/unless authoritative guidance is given, I think either quotes or italics would work for this, as long as it's consistently applied.

 

[Hypoxia]

I agree with NotWise and Simon.

I would, too, if I was comfy with, or compelled to, write textspeak. A high proportion of my stories adorn settings that preclude texting, so whew. (No cell towers are in range of Rancho Relaxo.) I can include observations of texting in odd circumstances, like the Positano gal keying her phone as she rode a Vespa with a fuzzy dog between her feet and a cigarette in her mouth. Context trumps content there, hey?

In the bright world of the future, we'll all have cyber-neural implants and will communicate via effective telepathy. Texting will go the way of rotary dials.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I just looked this up too, and didn't find any accepted convention. What little consensus I saw pointed to either treating it like dialogue or altering the font somehow, either italics or using a different font altogether (which isn't possible at Lit, obviously). I.e. the options already mentioned.

But, because I'm weird, and my brain said to try to make it mimic a text box/bubble somehow, I've been putting the texts in brackets. I haven't submitted a story with texting in it yet, so the following is just from the word doc I'm drafting in.

To the more experienced writers and editors here, would this look too confusing in a story here?

His phone buzzed, and it was a text from her. It read: [I can’t do vanilla tonight]
It took him a second to figure out what she meant. He replied: [Good] and then [I’m feeling the opposite of vanilla. Double dark chocolate.]
The wait for her response seemed longer than it should be. Then his phone buzzed: [Thank fucking god]

 

[KeithD]

I don't see why that would be more reader-friendly than using quote marks or italics. Using an entirely different font would be in the "Fiction for Dummies" presentation format.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I just looked this up too, and didn't find any accepted convention. What little consensus I saw pointed to either treating it like dialogue or altering the font somehow, either italics or using a different font altogether (which isn't possible at Lit, obviously). I.e. the options already mentioned.

But, because I'm weird, and my brain said to try to make it mimic a text box/bubble somehow, I've been putting the texts in brackets. I haven't submitted a story with texting in it yet, so the following is just from the word doc I'm drafting in.

To the more experienced writers and editors here, would this look too confusing in a story here?

I tried <text blah blah blah> as a way of indicating emails in one story and texts in another - visually a little "softer" than hard brackets [which stops the flow to my eyes] - but that approach inadvertently triggered an html meltdown in one story which completely buggered up the formatting (italics and bold both went haywire, when I didn't want either).

In my latest story, I have several email exchanges which I've indicated by adding an email-like address header with a date/time stamp to make it obvious, but standard font, and clear context when the narrative continues. Simple is best, I think, make the meaning clear through words, not different fonts.

Text dialogue though, I avoid. I either write characters capable of actually talking on a phone, or put them in the same room.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I don't see why that would be more reader-friendly than using quote marks or italics. Using an entirely different font would be in the "Fiction for Dummies" presentation format.

Ok. But my question is, would that be LESS reader friendly than using quote marks or italics?

Text dialogue though, I avoid. I either write characters capable of actually talking on a phone, or put them in the same room.

Do you mean "capable" as in the scenerio allows for talking on the phone?
Or, "capable" as in the intellect of the characters allows for it?
Because, lots of people do both. Myself included. I talk on the phone all day long. I converse via telephone at length with friends when the topic(s) call for it. I also communicate via text with the same people.

I the story I quoted above, my two characters are both at work, and are attempting to be discreet. The texts then segue into a phone conversation when they've both been able to duck into unoccupied rooms.

 

[KeithD]

Ok. But my question is, would that be LESS reader friendly than using quote marks or italics?

Yes. It's a completely alien use of straight brackets. Quotes and italics are used for such similar constructions that readers will probably read right through either with understanding. Publishers don't like using italics much, though.

 

[KeithD]

I also communicate via text with the same people.

Texting had become so engrained now that I think a standard way to show it needs to be formulated and given by the authorities. I think answers to presentation like this should be ways to reflect the chosen context, not ways to do something else and avoid the chosen media.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Do you mean "capable" as in the scenerio allows for talking on the phone?
Or, "capable" as in the intellect of the characters allows for it?

Tongue in cheek. I forever despair over three annoying phone habits:

1) when somebody is on the bus and they ring someone else to say, "I'll be there in five minutes," and either hang up, or drone on about something so incredibly banal the other passengers just want to kill them. My thought is, "So just arrive, it's a bus, it's on a timetable (in my city, at least), so just fucking arrive." And, no, I didn't want to know about the fat bitch at the counter who wouldn't give you the discount. Just. Fucking. Save. It. For. Later. It. Is. Not. Important.

2) - and my son does this and still hasn't learned - calls me from the car on the way to visit, says I'll be there in five minutes, and proceeds to have a conversation. That's a variant of 1.b above - it can wait, surely to God it can wait; and meanwhile his situational awareness in the car is compromised because he's bloody yacking on the phone. "But it's hands-free, Dad." "Yes, I know it's hands-free, but you're still distracted..."

And 3, an endless set of text messages (again, usually from son or daughter) trying to establish a meeting place or time or some such thing that could, with a bit of thought, be done in a single, informative message. Or, if there's question and answer involved, just call me, okay?

Christonabike, the other day my son proudly called me and said, "I've found this great app, Dad. You send a text message and it translates it to a voice message..." What the fuck?

Phones? Seriously, hipsters are cool. They're buying up the old dial phones, "Because it makes you slow everything down." Tin cans and string, Belle, tin cans and string .

 

[KeithD]

I don't use a cell phone. I have one in the trunk when we travel "just in case," but I'm afraid I wouldn't know how to use it.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I don't use a cell phone. I have one in the trunk when we travel "just in case," but I'm afraid I wouldn't know how to use it.

Here's a curious thing. In Oz, they're "mobiles," but in New Zealand, just across the big ditch, they too have "cell phones" (at least according to Brokenwood Mysteries, which is a highly recommended Kiwi police drama; very well written, quite funny, and with a superb sound track of kiwi country music - which is also completely different to Australian country music, more blues than country).

 

[Bramblethorn]

[re. using straight brackets to denote text messages]

Ok. But my question is, would that be LESS reader friendly than using quote marks or italics?

IMHO yes, it would be. Basically elaborating on what KeithD said: square brackets are normally used to flag meta-text, e.g. commentary on or explanation of the main text, Voice Of Editor. When used for "speech", I'd usually interpret that as an indication that the speech inside the []s should be understood as a paraphrase or translation of what the character actually said, e.g.:

"Thanks, that's all."
"Bis morgen!" [See you tomorrow.]

They are also occasionally used when nesting parentheses (like this [which is to say, like this]) but that's pretty rare; I'm not sure I've ever seen it in the wild.

Italics, OTOH, are used in a wide range of roles: emphasis, names of certain things like books and ships, foreign words, when referring to the word itself ("where does the word the come from?"), mathematical/physical variables and constants, distinguishing between genes and the proteins they code for, et cetera.

So readers are already used to italics meaning a lot of different things, and one more isn't such a big deal, as long as context makes it clear which is which.

And 3, an endless set of text messages (again, usually from son or daughter) trying to establish a meeting place or time or some such thing that could, with a bit of thought, be done in a single, informative message. Or, if there's question and answer involved, just call me, okay?

For a lot of younger folk, making voice calls for non-urgent stuff feels rude. It's like wandering up to somebody and demanding their attention RIGHT NOW, regardless of what they might be doing. Text lets the other person deal with it at their own convenience. It also provides a record of the conversation, which can be handy for those of us who are absent-minded.

But I'm with you 100% on calling while driving. I've had to make it clear to work minions that being late to a meeting is excusable, getting yourself killed trying to dial in while driving to the office is not.

 

[KeithD]

For a lot of younger folk, making voice calls for non-urgent stuff feels rude. It's like wandering up to somebody and demanding their attention RIGHT NOW, regardless of what they might be doing. Text lets the other person deal with it at their own convenience. It also provides a record of the conversation, which can be handy for those of us who are absent-minded.

Agree. When I was bookediting I said "no phone calls." E-mail. For the reasons given. I didn't want to be pulled out of what I was working on with a totally unrelated issue, and I wanted a record of who posted what. I checked e-mail often enough to catch everything quickly, but it was when I could focus on that.

 

[ElectricBlue]

For a lot of younger folk, making voice calls for non-urgent stuff feels rude. It's like wandering up to somebody and demanding their attention RIGHT NOW, regardless of what they might be doing. Text lets the other person deal with it at their own convenience. It also provides a record of the conversation, which can be handy for those of us who are absent-minded.

But I'm with you 100% on calling while driving. I've had to make it clear to work minions that being late to a meeting is excusable, getting yourself killed trying to dial in while driving to the office is not.

How do they cope in offices, then, when a phone is very often the first method of communication, if something IS important.

Seems to me a double standard, given their eagerness to tell me their shit immediately, but my shit is "non-urgent" all of a sudden? How does that work?

That's a redefinition of "rudeness" that's new to this old fart. When did that shift happen, coz I sure missed the memo on that one!

 

[Bramblethorn]

How do they cope in offices, then, when a phone is very often the first method of communication, if something IS important.

Same way people cope with uncomfortable ties and flickering lights and all the other annoyances of office life: by putting up with it as long as they have to, and then ditching it the moment they don't.

Anyway, a lot of offices are moving away from voice calls as the default method of communication. In my work, for instance, people who need to contact me impromptu will usually email me or use the work instant messaging system, or occasionally they'll lodge a Jira ticket.

We do have voice calls and video calls now and then. For a team spread across several locations, it's good to have a certain amount of face-to-face contact. But those are usually scheduled in advance. Even if it is urgent and a phone call is appropriate, they'll usually message me first to check that I'm available to talk; they understand that concentration is important.

That suits the kind of work that we do. Obviously if you're working in a tech support call centre or police dispatch, phone is going to be more important than it is for us! But async communication has a lot of advantages.

Seems to me a double standard, given their eagerness to tell me their shit immediately, but my shit is "non-urgent" all of a sudden? How does that work?

You were talking about Kids These Days texting you when they could be phoning you. In that context, by their lights, they're being polite, because they're letting you choose when to respond to the communication.

That's a redefinition of "rudeness" that's new to this old fart. When did that shift happen, coz I sure missed the memo on that one!

Pretty recently, I think - probably about the last ten or fifteen years?

When I was younger, I used voice calls a lot more, but I migrated to text around the time my partner started working night shifts - it saved on accidentally waking her up. Plus, having friends and a sweetheart in different continents makes voice kinda expensive.

 

[Handley_Page]

I just looked this up too, and didn't find any accepted convention. What little consensus I saw pointed to either treating it like dialogue or altering the font somehow, either italics or using a different font altogether (which isn't possible at Lit, obviously). I.e. the options already mentioned.

But, because I'm weird, and my brain said to try to make it mimic a text box/bubble somehow, I've been putting the texts in brackets. I haven't submitted a story with texting in it yet, so the following is just from the word doc I'm drafting in.

To the more experienced writers and editors here, would this look too confusing in a story here?

I prefer to put the 'text' on a separate line, not in the middle of a paragraph ful lof story.
Would that we could access a different fount (Courier ?) for the job.

 

[ElectricBlue]

You were talking about Kids These Days texting you when they could be phoning you. In that context, by their lights, they're being polite, because they're letting you choose when to respond to the communication.

I was actually moaning more about folk needlessly using a phone when in five minutes they're face to face, or not talking on the phone when that's the most efficient method of exchanging "I don't knows" to arrive quickly at, "Okay, see you thens." My kids are now in their mid/late twenties and are only two years apart, and they have diametrically opposite phone habits, so maybe it's a male/female thing. But, when we are all face to face, phones are far away and we actually talk. Which I believe, in some families, is a novelty .

 

[Bramblethorn]

I was actually moaning more about folk needlessly using a phone when in five minutes they're face to face, or not talking on the phone when that's the most efficient method of exchanging "I don't knows" to arrive quickly at, "Okay, see you thens." My kids are now in their mid/late twenties and are only two years apart, and they have diametrically opposite phone habits, so maybe it's a male/female thing. But, when we are all face to face, phones are far away and we actually talk. Which I believe, in some families, is a novelty .

Sounds dreadful. ;-)

(My partner and I have been known to sit at opposite ends of the house chatting via Skype. I like text.)