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[29wordsforsnow]

Recently an idea came to my mind to have more than just one 'narrator' in a poem - to be precise four different points of view. I wondered how to make clear who's telling which line. I think something like 'A sees...', 'B thinks...' is out of question in a poem.

Different rhymes schemes could do, but I assume people might become confused/annoyed by such a style. Different accents/slangs could do as well, but I don't feel confident in those and it looks like a big challenge to do so in just a few words of a verse line.

My choice would be to use different text formats: normal, italics, bold, ???. According to the FAQ the first three are commonly accepted by mods/admins? What others can be asked for? I think I've seen underlined too.

Now, something I would like to discuss or ask for feedback from people who have experience with: how can such formatting be translated to readers who are visually impaired. Is there a way to point out to such a differentation.

Maybe that's a general question non-poetry might be interested in, too. Would be interesting if for example italics, sometimes used for thoughts, memories etc., are recognized by all readers.

Thanks in advance for any feedback on that topic.
29*

 

[butters]

perhaps different fonts, or two fonts both used 'flat' and 'italic' to give 4 different appearances? I'd find underlined text to be ugly and offputting to read.

Also, page layout could be used for additional visual differentiation/distance

I suppose you could tinker with coloured lettering but I know, personally, I'd find that a distraction. I'd probably opt for 4 different fonts.

 

[Tzara]

Recently an idea came to my mind to have more than just one 'narrator' in a poem - to be precise four different points of view. I wondered how to make clear who's telling which line. I think something like 'A sees...', 'B thinks...' is out of question in a poem.

Different rhymes schemes could do, but I assume people might become confused/annoyed by such a style. Different accents/slangs could do as well, but I don't feel confident in those and it looks like a big challenge to do so in just a few words of a verse line.

My choice would be to use different text formats: normal, italics, bold, ???. According to the FAQ the first three are commonly accepted by mods/admins? What others can be asked for? I think I've seen underlined too.

The use of multiple fonts is, in general, discouraged in book design as it tends to make the text hard to read--that includes switching back and forth from normal, bold, italic, underline, etc. as well. Some limited use of different fonts is OK (e.g. use of italic to denote thoughts or dialogue) but using different fonts to signal different narrators would likely look amateurish.

If you only have two narrators, using quoted text for one and normal text for the other might work, especially if one of the narrators is "I" and one is "other" (see this poem by A. E. Housman, for example), but generally I would suggest simply using play-like tags to make clear who is speaking (see this example by Edmund Spenser for two narrators). As the opening strophe of the Spenser selection indicates, the tag method allows you to show something as being spoken by both narrators at the same time.

Now, something I would like to discuss or ask for feedback from people who have experience with: how can such formatting be translated to readers who are visually impaired. Is there a way to point out to such a differentiation.

In audiobooks, change of narration is (at least in my experience) handled by the person recording the book changing their speech to evoke a different character. Braille supports bold, italic, and underline markers (see here). I don't know if it has the concept of different fonts beyond this.

 

[29wordsforsnow]

Thanks, Tzara, for the deep insight and the links. I put that idea back to the drawer for later use in a short story.

 

[butters]

The use of multiple fonts is, in general, discouraged in book design as it tends to make the text hard to read--that includes switching back and forth from normal, bold, italic, underline, etc. as well. Some limited use of different fonts is OK (e.g. use of italic to denote thoughts or dialogue) but using different fonts to signal different narrators would likely look amateurish.

If you only have two narrators, using quoted text for one and normal text for the other might work, especially if one of the narrators is "I" and one is "other" (see this poem by A. E. Housman, for example), but generally I would suggest simply using play-like tags to make clear who is speaking (see this example by Edmund Spenser for two narrators). As the opening strophe of the Spenser selection indicates, the tag method allows you to show something as being spoken by both narrators at the same time.
In audiobooks, change of narration is (at least in my experience) handled by the person recording the book changing their speech to evoke a different character. Braille supports bold, italic, and underline markers (see here). I don't know if it has the concept of different fonts beyond this.

ah, yes, I suppose so. I thought they meant for here, on the forum... I'm not judgy

 

[Tzara]

Recently an idea came to my mind to have more than just one 'narrator' in a poem - to be precise four different points of view. I wondered how to make clear who's telling which line. I think something like 'A sees...', 'B thinks...' is out of question in a poem.

Different rhymes schemes could do, but I assume people might become confused/annoyed by such a style. Different accents/slangs could do as well, but I don't feel confident in those and it looks like a big challenge to do so in just a few words of a verse line.

My choice would be to use different text formats: normal, italics, bold, ???.

29*

In my current reading, I've just happened to come across a relevant comment, from the "Note on the Text" section of the revised edition of Jan Zwicky's Wittgenstein Elegies. In Zwicky's text, there are various "narrators" or sources of text, notably the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, the poet Georg Trakl, the quasi-entity "Stillness," and two of Wittgenstein's works, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and the Philosophical Investigations. Here's Zwicky's comment on the formatting of the revised edition:

The speakers were unnamed in the first edition, and shifts from one voice to another were indicated purely by varying indents. For this edition, the author has revised the text substantially and chosen a new format to distinguish the multiple voices from one another.​

The revised edition differentiates narrators by naming them in a column printed left of the text proper, somewhat similar to a play text.

Presumably, she has decided this makes the "speaker" of the relevant lines more clear than her original method of varying the text presentation.