Citations
Titles
Italicize all play titles; if you cannot print italics, underline the title. (e.g., King Richard III or Richard III). Italicize all book titles as well as the names of journals, magazines, and films. Any free-standing publication or artifact with a name receives italics (e.g., The Mill on the Floss, Vertigo, Shakespeare Quarterly, etc.)
Enclose in quotation marks the titles of short stories in a larger collection, poems in an anthology, articles within a journal, chapters of a book. These do not appear as free-standing publications; they are printed within a larger publication. Examples: Meredith Skura, "Discourse and the Individual," Shakespeare Quarterly, (Summer 1989): 341-56, or "Araby," in Dubliners by James Joyce.
Quotations
When you indent any quotation (indent any passage longer than two sentences), you do not need quotation marks. When quoting verse, always show the lineation. Use slash marks to indicate the line divisions when you do not indent; incidentally, indent any quotations longer than three lines. If you indent the quotation, show the line divisions exactly as they appear in the text you quote.
When quoting a play and referring to act, line, and scene (which is the way to locate any quotation in a play that has such divisions), a capital Roman letter designates the act, a lower case Roman letter refers to the scene, and Arabic numbers enumerate the lines. Add periods after the act and scene numbers (e.g., II. iii. 1-12). You may also employ Arabic numerals with periods for all three divisions (e.g., 1. 3. 51-60). You may use this abbreviation not only in quotations, but also in your own sentences (e.g., "In I. iii. the Duke betrays his anger.")
You will find all other necessary rules for style, punctuation, format, etc., in the latest MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 4th edition (1995). All students in English courses should consult this handbook before turning in any paper.
Scaffoldings (and wordiness)
You can strengthen many sentences by cleaning away brush; a pruned sentence more cogently conveys its meanings, just as a trimmed tree more visibly shows its pattern of branches. Using another metaphor: lithe sentences exert greater force with more grace.
It is...that
This locution has no function except to serve as a platform or scaffolding; such a facade hides the architecture of your thought. The sentence below shows how to cut away gratuitous structures and provide more direct access to the sentence, which remains intact after the amputations.
Before: It is their rejecting of his orders and their own reactions to death, Clarence, and God that caused the various problems and subsequent complications of this scene. 27 words
After:
Their rejecting his orders and their own reactions to Clarence, death, and God caused the various problems and subsequent complications of this scene.
Here's another example of an "it is...that" scaffolding and how it can be removed, leaving the sentence whole.
Before: It was in this setting that we were able to make a definite statement about Richard's total lack of loyalty to God and respect for any religion.
After:
In this setting we were able to make a definite statement about Richard's total lack of loyalty to God and respect for any religion.
various
This term is unnecessary; in the sentence about Clarence, "various problems" is really redundant; the plural "problems" suggests both many as well as different problems. Before: Their rejecting his orders and their own reactions to Clarence, death, and God caused the various problems and subsequent complications of this scene.
After:
Their rejecting his orders and their own reactions to Clarence, death, and God caused the problems and subsequent complications of this scene. (21 words)
of
Very often gerunds do not need an extra preposition. Always look for ways to eliminate prepositions, especially when you find more three or more in a sentence. Preposition pile-ups stop traffic! "Their rejecting of his orders..." neatly reduces to "their rejecting his orders." Other examples: Before: His telling of his problems endeared him to his listeners. After: His telling his problems endeared him to his listeners.
Before: Their losing of the war resulted in their becoming allies.
After: Losing the war resulted in their becoming allies.
Able to, try to
We can also eliminate a wordy verb structure, able to ; in the same way, try to can nearly always be eliminated before the main verb: Before: In this setting we were able to make a definite statement about Richard's total lack of loyalty to God and respect for any religion.
After:
In this setting we made a definite statement about Richard's total lack of loyalty to God and respect for any religion.
Before:
This course will try to consider seven Shakespeare plays.
After:
This course will consider seven Shakespeare plays.
The reason was
The purpose was
Often you can eliminate these locutions and substitute "because" or "in order to." Here's an example: Before: Clarence's real purpose in laboring to give his long speeches about damnation was to put off the inevitability of his own death.
After:
Clarence labored to give his long speeches about damnation in order to delay the inevitability of his own death.
(clumsy "put off" can be revised into the more precise "delay").
Before:
The reason I went to the store was to buy bread.
After:
I went to the store to buy bread.
Before:
The reason she accepted Richard's proposal was her desire to gain security in a newly-hostile court.
After:
Because she desired security in a newly-hostile court, she accepted Richard's proposal.
or
She accepted Richard's proposal in order to gain security in a newly-hostile court.
Placement of modifiers
Adverbial phrases
Long adverbial phrases that tell how, when, or where some complicated action occurs can separate the subject from the main verb or prevent other important connections (in the example below a noun is cut off from its modifying relative pronoun clause). Sometimes these phrases divorce key elements from one another, or they interrupt or defer important syntactic links. Placing the adverbial clause before the longer clause often permits a direct route through a sentence instead of an awkward detour. Notice: Before: The irony of this scene lies in the very fact that Anne put down the sword, as she let down her guard and succumbed to Richard's advances, that Richard so rudely stole from the chest of the dead King, even after he plainly admitted that he not only killed King Henry VI, but that he also murdered her young husband.
After:
The irony of this scene lies in the very fact that, as she let down her guard and succumbed to Richard's advances, Anne put down the sword that Richard so rudely stole from the chest of the dead King, even after he plainly admitted that he not only killed King Henry VI, but that he also murdered her young husband.
Only
In speech we insert "only" rather indiscriminately. In writing, however, its force is very exact; it modifies only the word (or phrase) it precedes. In formal writing "only" must therefore be placed in front of the precise term it modifies . If I say, "He only spoke to her," I mean he did not whisper, he did not shout, he did not mumble, he only spoke. But if I am not concerned with his style of speech, but with the fact it was only her to whom he spoke, I need to place "only" before to her. Thus: "He spoke only to her."
Similarly, consider the difference between the two sentences: "She only eats vegetables" and "She eats only vegetables." In the first case, I suggest she never consumes, gobbles, nibbles, or chews her veggies; the one and only action she performs is eating. Hey, that's not my point! I want to emphasize she restricts her eating to vegetables. In that case I need to use the second sentence, "She eats only vegetables."
Parallel structure
Frequently phrases in a sentence share the same function. They may serve as items in a series, two actions performed by the same agent, two adverbial clauses telling how and when some action occurred, or the like. In all such cases, the phrases must use the same syntactic structure, called parallel structure. In the sentence above, seeing the relationship between Richard's two crimes can be enhanced by making the syntax exactly the same. This parallelism of grammar highlights the likeness of the actions compared. Notice in this case we make a parallel between not only...but also ....) We also can eliminate an extra "that."
Before: The irony of this scene lies in the very fact that, as she let down her guard and succumbed to Richard's advances, Anne put down the sword that Richard so rudely stole from the chest of the dead King, even after he plainly admitted that he not only killed King Henry VI, but that he also murdered her young husband. 60 words
After:
The irony of this scene lies in the very fact that, as she let down her guard and succumbed to Richard's advances, Anne put down the sword that Richard so rudely stole from the chest of the dead King, even after he plainly admitted that he not only killed King Henry VI but also murdered her young husband.
Once we clean up the parallelism, we notice we can unify two different verbs, "killed" and "murdered." Do we want to emphasize more economically the likeness of Richard's crimes? We might then prefer this phrasing: "He killed not only King Henry VI but also her young husband"? The idea that he caused both deaths may come through more strongly by using a single verb. If, however, we want to retain a degree of difference between the two actions, to intensify the second crime, that he killed the king and murdered the young husband, then we will want to retain two distinct verbs.
In the most economical version of this same sentence, we also trim two instances of "that" and an unnecessary intensifier, "very":
Before: The irony of this scene lies in the very fact that, as she let down her guard and succumbed to Richard's advances, Anne put down the sword that Richard so rudely stole from the chest of the dead King, even after he plainly admitted that he not only killed King Henry VI but also murdered her young husband.
After:
The irony of this scene lies in the fact that, as she let down her guard and succumbed to Richard's advances, Anne put down the sword Richard so rudely stole from the chest of the dead King, even after he plainly admitted he killed not only King Henry VI but also her young husband. 54 words
Let's look at one more example of parallelism. Note how each parallel phrase must begin with a gerund followed by a noun clause:
Before: The murderer's alignment with Clarence was illustrated in his sympathetic gestures, his caressing of the cross, his placing his hand on Clarence's shoulder when he told him that he must die, and finally when he left the stage to retrieve his dagger and sneak out of the church.
After:
The murderer's alignment with Clarence was illustrated in his making sympathetic gestures, caressing the cross, placing his hand on Clarence's shoulder when he told him that he must die, and leaving the stage to retrieve his dagger and sneak out of the church.
Action verbs
MAKE A RULE TO CHECK EVERY VERB IN EVERY SENTENCE.
To be
Whenever possible, eliminate forms of "to be" and introduce an action verb instead. An action verb can name precise actions and describe many more subtle relationships than can the static form "to be." "Is," "are," "were," and other forms of "to be" can indicate only the identity or attributes of the subject. Action verbs more dramatically and economically depict cause and effect and other relationships. You will often create the new verb from one of your nouns; this conversion transforms some static object into a more dynamic action. Notice verbs in the following unrevised and improved sentences (we will also produce parallel structure): Before: The church setting was not only the burial of the dead, but also a symbolic representation of Anne's marriage to Richard and her ensuing death. 23 words
After:
The church setting not only depicted the burial of the dead but also symbolically represented Anne's marriage to Richard and her ensuing death. 21 words
We got rid of a static verb, "was," replacing it with "depicts"; we found a lively and specific verb, "represents" in the noun "representation;" and we eliminated a prepositional phrase.
Here are more examples:
Before: The only indicator that Jonathan and Shana are not the halberdiers returning for the body was the movement of the body, snoring, and various other indicators of a body in rest and not in death. 35 words
After:
The movement of the body, snoring, and other signs of a resting body and not a dead one indicated that Jonathan and Shana are not the halberdiers returning for the body. 31 words
"Indicator" becomes the verb "indicates" and replaces the dull verb "are;" a second use of "indicators" is changed to "signs;" and "various" is trimmed away.
There is , It is
When you check every verb, you will always notice when you use an empty subject and verb such as "there is' or"it is." The term "there" is a stand-in for a real subject, so always try to eliminate this locution in favor a substantive subject; you will then also replace the form of "to be" with an action verb. Notice the difference: Before: There was definitely a difference in the personalities of Murderer 1 and Murderer 1.
After:
The personalities of Murderer 1 and Murderer 2 definitely differed.
Once again, we locate a lively and specific verb, "differ" in the noun "difference."
Here's another example of gain through loss :
Before: There is nothing I love better than you.
After:
I love nothing better than you.
Passive Voice
Whenever possible, change passive voice to active voice. In changing to active voice, we often find ways to change clunky nouns and prepositions into vibrant action verbs.
Before: Murderer 2's sympathy for Clarence is born out of his eventual understanding of Clarence's misconception of his brother Gloucester's devotion for him.
After:
Murderer 2's eventually understands Clarence's misconception of his brother Gloucester's devotion for him, and therefore sympathizes with Clarence.
Here is another example of changing passive to active voice: Before: It was decided that I would play Prospero in I. ii.
After:
We decided I would play Prospero in I. iii.
Rationale: Frequently passive voice sentences do not show the agent of the action, and thus do not hold anyone accountable for the actions. Passive voice requires a helping verb, and, when we do mention the agent, we have to use a prepositional phrase (e.g. "The car was driven by Damon"). In sum, passive voice is more indirect, often irresponsible, wordy, and convoluted.
Credits
Most of the examples above quote verbatim from a very fine student scene journal; in no way should these examples reflect on the writer; they were simply closest at hand as I began this little handbook. I modified some of the sentences so they would make more sense, and I made up a few sentences for the occasion. In some cases, sentences could be improved still more. If you spot other changes that you would prefer, congratulations, you are on your way to becoming a better writer! Thank you to the anonymous writer whose work I used.