Ellipsis - Roland Stroud

1. PUNCTUATION
1.1 Ellipsis
OMISSION OF TEXT
1.1.1 Ellipsis, which is the omission of a portion of quoted text, is an important device in scholarly,
scientific, and other literary work because the writer often needs to quote from a source without
including irrelevant material and extraneous phrases.
PAUSE IN SPEECH
1.1.2 Ellipsis may also indicate a pause or an interruption in dialogue in a literary work. See further
discussion in the paragraph below on ELLIPSIS IN PLAYS & SCREENPLAYS for details.
STANDARD METHOD OF ELLIPSIS
1.1.3 Ellipsis within a sentence. The ellipsis should consist of three dots, spaces between the dots, and
spaces surrounding the dots.
Original:
Shakespeare was born in 1564 in Stratford-on-Avon in England.
With ellipsis:
Shakespeare was born . . . in England.
Bad forms may have too many dots, or no space between dots, or improper spacing around
dots:
Shakespeare was born...in England.
Shakespeare was born. . .in England.
Shakespeare was born. . . in England.
Shakespeare was born. . . .in England.
Shakespeare was born. . . . in England.
1.1.4 Interior punctuation in ellipsis. Generally it serves no good purpose to retain punctuation that
came before ellipsis within a sentence. The writer should consider each case for its individual
needs:
Original:
In a famous pamphlet that circulated widely, some contemporary writers criticized English table
manners and other English habits.
Correct but messy:
In a famous pamphlet that circulated widely, . . . writers criticized English table manners and
other English habits.
Correct and less distracting:
In a famous pamphlet that circulated widely . . . writers criticized English table manners and
other English habits.
1.1.5 Ellipsis at the end of a sentence. If the ellipsis comes at the end of a grammatically complete
unit, the terminal punctuation of the original is retained and then is followed by a space and
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three dots with spaces. (Terminal punctuation includes ‘.’, ‘?’, ‘!’, and sometimes ‘:’.) The
following example demonstrates the various principles:
Original:
Shakespeare was born in 1564 in Stratford-on-Avon in England. As a young man, he went to
London, maybe took some odd jobs here and there, and soon became a prominent actor and
playwright. He was also a shareholder in the Globe theater, where his plays were performed. Don’t
you think those are good accomplishments for a small-town boy?
With ellipsis:
Shakespeare was born . . . in Stratford-on-Avon in England. As a young man, he went to
London . . . and soon became a prominent actor and playwright. He was also a shareholder in the
Globe theater. . . . Don’t you think those are good accomplishments? . . .
A SIMPLER METHOD OF ELLIPSIS
1.1.6 A more sensible approach is to use three dots for ellipsis in all instances to connect text to text,
with spaces separating the dots from each other and the surrounding text. The Chicago Manual
of Style (14th edition, 1994) prefers the standard method outlined above but will allow this
simpler method, provided that the author uses it consistently. Termination of the quotation still
requires four dots (or a question mark or exclamation point, followed by three dots):
Shakespeare was born . . . in Stratford-on-Avon in England. As a young man, he went to
London . . . and soon became a prominent actor and playwright. He was also a shareholder in the
Globe theater . . . Don’t you think those are good accomplishments? . . .
CAPITALIZATION AFTER ELLIPSIS
1.1.7 The first word after an ellipsis, if it is not already the beginning of a sentence, may be left in
lower case, introduced with a bracketed capital, or simply capitalized. Conservative authorities
pedantically require the use of a bracketed capital, in all scholarly works, to show that the word
did not originally begin a sentence. The following examples illustrate capitalization and the
optional use of three or four dots:
Scholarly:
Shakespeare was born in 1564. . . . [H]e went to London, maybe took some odd jobs here and
there, and soon became a prominent actor. . . .
Shakespeare was born in 1564 . . . [H]e went to London, maybe took some odd jobs here and
there, and soon became a prominent actor. . . .
Acceptable:
Shakespeare was born in 1564. . . . he went to London, maybe took some odd jobs here and
there, and soon became a prominent actor. . . .
Shakespeare was born in 1564. . . . He went to London, maybe took some odd jobs here and
there, and soon became a prominent actor. . . .
Shakespeare was born in 1564 . . . He went to London, maybe took some odd jobs here and there,
and soon became a prominent actor. . . .
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CONSISTENCY
1.1.8 It is proper style to use the same method for representing ellipsis throughout the entirety of a
work. It is not unusual to find lackadaisical writing with improperly placed groups of three or
four dots, with no consistency whatever.
SPACING OF DOTS
1.1.9 The spacing of the dots is important. Although it is common for writers to place the dots
together with no spaces between them, such practice is generally unacceptable. As a rule, there
should always be a space between any two dots, as well as between a dot and any other
adjacent mark of punctuation. (See ELLIPSIS IN PLAYS & SCREENPLAYS, below, for the exception
when using a monospaced font.)
ELLIPSIS IN PLAYS & SCREENPLAYS
1.1.10 Exception to the rule. Dialogue lines in screenplays are very short (3-3½ inches). The standard
font is monospaced Courier. Ellipsis dots with spaces gobble up a good deal of line length in a
monospaced font that gives only ten characters per inch. Over a script of 115 pages, this lost
space can add up. Moreover, word wrap in screenwriting software is not as sophisticated and
customizable, at present, as in word processors. Dots may become separated at the end of a line
when the line wraps. For these reasons it is better to omit the spaces between the dots.
Obviously, this is an exception to the principles laboriously outlined above.
1.1.11 The current practice of handling ellipsis in screenplays appears to follow the whim of each
writer. Nonetheless, it is possible to offer some guidelines which are a rational application and
modification of the general principles already presented.
1.1.12 Four-dot method. Use of four-dot ellipsis (or ‘?’ or ‘!’, plus three dots) at the end of a
grammatically complete unit, and three dots to link within the same sentence, is the most logical
method. In the next example the ‘. . . .’ after today signals an end of the sentence and a pause
or sudden change. The ‘? . . .’ after wrong is likewise the end of a sentence and the start of a
break. The first dot (or ‘?’ or ‘!’) is printed up close to the preceding word. The ‘. . .’ between
just and tell connects two fragments and has spaces before and after the group, since Please,
just is not a complete sentence.
Excellent form:
HANK
You look strange today.... What’s
wrong?... Please, just ... tell me.
1.1.13 Three-dot method. Many writers cannot distinguish easily between text that is grammatically
complete and text that is fragmentary. Fortunately, three-dot ellipsis, which is an acceptable
method, keeps everything simple. As long as the dot group is preceded and followed by a space,
three dots can connect a sentence to a sentence, a sentence to a fragment, or a fragment to a
fragment. Although writers commonly use the three dots, they frequently fail to set the dot
group off with spaces. It is noteworthy that formatting properly by adding spaces can actually
save line space sometimes and sometimes result in fewer lines, because the spaces before and
after the dot group allow better word wrap. The following examples illustrate this.
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Good form:
HANK
You look strange today ... What’s
wrong?... Please, just ... tell me.
JIM
Is this what you call ... friendly
... or are you kidding?
Poor form:
HANK
You look strange today...What’s
wrong?...Please, just...tell me.
JIM
Is this what you
call...friendly...or are you
kidding?
1.1.14 Dialogue that trails off. Sometimes a writer will use a series of dots at the very end of a speech
to indicate that the words trail off or that a pause ensues. The speaker seems to have said all
that he intends to at the moment. To convey this, the writer will preferably use the four-dot
form (or ‘?’ or ‘!’, plus three dots) if the statement is grammatically complete. However, the
three-dot form is an acceptable alternative in this situation. In the event that the statement is not
grammatically complete, the three-dot ellipsis is the proper form:
Preferable:
Acceptable:
I guess this is my friend....
With all his money, still ...
Is this my friend?...
You’ve got to be kidding!...
I guess this is my friend ...
1.1.15 Interrupted speech. If a speech, instead of coming to a natural pause or stop, is interrupted, then
three dots (not four) mark the break, regardless of grammatical completeness. If there is a later
continuation, three dots, set off from the text, can optionally introduce the continuation.
Good form:
HANK
I saw her just yesterday ...
JIM
(interrupting)
Look out for that car!
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HANK
... Yeah, I see it.... Anyway, as I
was saying, she told me the whole
story.
1.1.16 Putting spaces between ellipsis dots will waste space in short lines composed in a monospaced
font, even though the method is technically correct.
Correct but inefficient in screenplay dialogue:
HANK
Is this what you call . . .
friendly?
Much better:
HANK
Is this what you call ... friendly?
Miscellaneous sloppy methods which one may encounter include:
Is that what you call.... friendly?
Is that what you call... friendly?
Is that what you call....friendly?
This is my friend....His name is
Mike.
I guess this is my friend...
That’s silly. ...Wouldn’t you
agree?
The last example appeared, with completely different words, in the magazine Creative
Screenwriter in an excerpt from a screenplay. Presumably the author, who is a prominent
screenwriter in Hollywood, was trying to convey a directorial hint that the character pauses
briefly at the end of the sentence, after silly, and then adds an afterthought. But the method
offers no advantage over either of the correct methods:
That’s silly.... Wouldn’t you
agree?
That’s silly ... Wouldn’t you
agree?
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ELLIPSIS WITH COMPUTERS
1.1.17 Another problem that arises in spacing the dots, when using computers (and who does not
today?), is that spaced dots may unexpectedly “wrap” at the end of a line, breaking between two
of the dots:
The man picked up his change and counted it. “Say, buddy,” he asked the waiter, “Did . .
. you make a mistake?”
This problem is avoidable with most high-end word processors, which allow the writer to enter
a special space that will not break. In WordPerfect® it is Ctrl-Space. In Microsoft® Word97 it
is Ctrl-Shift-Space. In WordPerfect® (DOS version) it is Home-Space. It is permissible to have
‘. . .’ at the end or start of a line if it happens to fall there.
Computers can produce (in some font sets, anyway) a special three-dot character ‘…’ (no
spaces) when the keyboard operator strikes a combination of keys:
• ANSI character number 133: on numeric keypad with Alt-0133
• In Microsoft® Word97: Alt-Shift-Period
• In WordPerfect®: Ctrl-W 4,56
However, this character is not appropriate for representing ellipsis, since it consists of three dots
with no spaces and in some fonts produces three exceedingly tiny dots.
Microsoft® Word97, under Tools/AutoCorrect, has a list of replacement “corrections” that the
program makes when certain key combinations are struck. Typing three dots in succession (no
spaces) will trigger an automatic replacement by the tiny ellipsis character. Consequently, users
should consider deleting this “correction” from AutoCorrect. (It can be restored at any time by
re-entering three dots in AutoCorrect and inserting the ellipsis symbol from the Insert/Symbol
menu.)
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
1.1.18 Ellipsis in two successive paragraphs. A paragraph may end with ellipsis and the next
paragraph begin with ellipsis. In that case, the last sentence of the first paragraph follows the
principles discussed above, and the next paragraph is introduced by the usual first-line
indentation, followed by a group of three dots with spaces and a space after the group.
1.1.19 Ellipsis in poetry. Sometimes it is convenient to leave out one or more lines of a poem that is
being quoted. Omission is signaled by placing a line of spaced dots across the entire line length.
The line of dots can stand for any number of lines in succession — e.g., deletion of lines 5, 6,
7 would require just one line of dots. Deletion of line 14 would require another line of dots.
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