Sorry for the crappy subject line, I couldn’t think of a better way to phrase it.
I’m a bit stumped right now. I’m editing this financial / legal document and, not surprisingly, there are some references to publications with crazy long titles. A sentence includes one such title and then goes on afterward before getting its own period. This looks all kinds of wrong to me, but I can’t find a good cite to explain how best to deal with it.
Ugh, that doesn’t explain it any better, does it? Okay, here’s the (heavily paraphrased) text as a sample:
That period after the word “go” is what’s bugging me. I wouldn’t mind it so much if the title were italicized, but this firm’s style guide prefers quotation marks for in-house documents. (It also mandates no title caps, before anyone says anything; they prefer sentence case for such titles.) So I guess my question is: is this punctuated correctly even though the sentence surrounding the title continues afterward?
(Lots of thanks to anyone who can parse just what the hell I mean, 'cause I can barely do it and I know what i mean!)
I see no problem whatever with quoting the period. What I do object to, and quite strongly, is putting a period inside a quote when it wasn’t there in the original. I have no problem with a period or other punctuation outside the quotes.
Was there not a period after beneficiaries in the original title? I’d say there should be if they are punctuating the end of the first sentence with a period. If there is a period there, then the comma should be a period. In either case I’d not use a comma but insert “as” right after the quote.
Oy veh, what a mess. Thanks! Good question, Old Guy – I’ll have to note that in the comments. I don’t have access to the name of the pamphlet.
But you’re not saying that if there’s a period after “beneficiaries” I should retain that period, then continue the sentence with “as…” are you? Because I think that would look even worse. If there is a period after that word, I’d try to get them to phrase the sentence so it ends with the title rather than continues onward (e.g., "…we offer the information in one of our series of pamphlets, “Your will etc.”).
Erm, Keeve, your advice is appreciated, but trust me, if it were in the firm’s style guide I wouldn’t be having this issue. Regardless of my own taste, I follow the style guide until it lets me down, as it does now; that’s when I have to use my own judgment and my trusty Chicago / AP style guides. Unfortunately I’m not finding anything in either of 'em regarding this issue (or my search-fu is weak tonight).
Ah, a question for the ages. I have no idea. I’m one of their outsourced proofreaders, a gal they call on when their sole full-time and thus overworked proofreader needs backup or needs to be double-checked. I usually get stuff last minute at night (as you see) or on the weekends, which means I’m unable to interact with the regular staffers.
I’ll put it this way: when I first read the style guide last week, I found a typo and a missing parenthesis. I passed the corrections along to the guy who hired me (I did so very humbly, I promise). All I’m sayin’ is, if their style guide writer can’t be bothered to spellcheck… they have issues at the top!
I’d paraphrase it so the title is at the end of the sentence:
For those who want to provide guidance to trustees regarding distribution and spending, we offer one of our bank’s series on trusts entitled, “Your will: Eventually your money’s gonna go. Here’s how to deal with profligate beneficiaries".
Another thing to consider is whether the subtitle is really separated by a period, or is someone assuming a period is there? If there’s no period on the book/pamphlet cover, then find some other offset. Since a colon is already used as a first offset, use a dash or parentheses like so:
For those who want to provide guidance to trustees regarding distribution and spending, we offer one of our bank’s series on trusts entitled, “Your will: Eventually your money’s gonna go – Here’s how to deal with profligate beneficiaries".
For those who want to provide guidance to trustees regarding distribution and spending, we offer one of our bank’s series on trusts entitled, “Your will: Eventually your money’s gonna go (Here’s how to deal with profligate beneficiaries)".
Heh, thanks for the sympathies, Keeve! Yes, it’s a tough position. In the end I can only suggest, it’s up to them to decide whether to include my suggestions or not. I’m rather glad not to be the finaly decision-maker here.
No, good point. But that’s at the end of a sentence. Also, dialogue is different from a title. According to their house style, as it turns out, their titles usually don’t end in periods. Periods in the middle of the title? Perfectly fine. End of title? No good. That kind of inconsistency makes me grit my teeth! As an example, one pamphlet had a title similar to the following:
ChoieBank is the best choice for you. See what we can do
… Ugh! Is it just me or does that lack of period drive anyone else bonkers? It’s practically a cliffhanger. When that happens I’ve suggested using an em-dash if it’s not too breathless-sounding (“ChoieBank is the best choice for you–see what we can do”) or a semicolon. Or just freakin’ end the title with a period!
Ah well, mine is not to question why, mine is but to do and cash my checks.
Thanks! Yep, that’s pretty much what I went with for my final suggestion, although since we’re in the U.S., the final period goes within the closing quotation mark. If we were asking a question, however, the question mark would go outside the quotes. Weird leftover habit from the days of old-fashioned print presses, I believe.
Again many thanks to everyone who helped out. This was actually the easier of the two jobs I’ve done for this organization so far. The first was this endless financial disclosure document, and the amount of investment banking jargon that I had to learn and double-check is just off-the-charts. I’m sorry, but any industry that considers the sentence “We remain overweight cash” as correct is just being purposely obnoxious!
I would say that if there is a period at the end of a title, changing it to a comma when the title doesn’t end the sentence is appropriate just as with a quotation. Periods are generally considered “weak” punctuation, which can be changed or omitted in favor of other punctuation at the end of a sentence or quotation. A comma always replaces a period at the end of a quotation that doesn’t end a sentence, and a question mark or exclamation point always causes a period to be omitted at the end of a sentence or quotation.
Given the added confusion caused by the mid-title period, which apparently can’t be eliminated, I’d say moriah’s suggestion, modified to put the final period inside the quotation mark, is the best.
The Chicago Manual of Style website runs a great online Q-and-A column dealing with issues like this. I once wrote in with a similar question about parentheses and got back a very helpful personal answer, even though they didn’t run my question on line. The editor who writes the answers is great at dealing with this kind of situation where the usual rules seem to conflict or result in something horrible.
