Punctuation after a sequence of questions?

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JaCKo__007

#399684 Thu, 02 Aug 07 07:41 PM

Hi everybody! I'm fresh around here.

Was wondering if anyone could help me out with a couple of questions.

The first is: say you have a series of questions one after another. What kind of punctuation would you use in between. Would it be simply: Why did you do this? Where is he? How could you have ever come up with such a thing? How dare you? Are you completely mad? Or would you use commas or semi-colons in between, or maybe something else?

The other question I have is:

Say you had a book with a multitude of chapters. And the main ones, of which there are 4, were all written in uppercase. What about the rest then? Would you write the chapters using the capitals rules for titles, or would you use capitals only for the first word of the chapter title? I've noticed books had descrepancies on this subject - maybe there's a difference between AmE and BrE?

Thanks a bunch! Big Smile [:D]

JaCKo__007

Joined on Thu, Aug 2 2007

Ljubljana

New Member (20)

*** Life depends on point of view, mine's positive! ***

Difference between, Colons, Commas, Punctuation

Grammar Geek

#399708 Thu, 02 Aug 07 08:26 PM

Hi there Jacko,

Welcome to the forums.

First question: You should use a ? after each question. Be aware, though, that more than a couple questions in a row could be seen as ... well, a bit like an inquisition. (In your example, the "How dare you" sounds like it should be "How dare you!")

Second questin: I'm not sure what you mean, I'm afraid. Do you mean the chapter titles are writtin in all caps? There are no formal grammar rules for things like this, but there are common style conventions. One is that anything written in all capital letters is simply hard to read and should be avoided for anything other than a few words.

Capitalizing the first word of the chapter, or making the very first letter huge, is simply a design element, and there are no requirements for this at all. Please let me know if this doesn't answer your question, though.

Barb

Grammar Geek

Joined on Tue, Jan 10 2006

Pennsylvania, USA

Veteran Member (15,591)

Barbara, who answers in American English.

Capital letters, Grammar, Punctuation

Feebs11

#399737 Thu, 02 Aug 07 11:15 PM

JaCKo__007 wrote:
Hi everybody! I'm fresh around here.

Was wondering if anyone could help me out with a couple of questions.

The first is: say you have a series of questions one after another. What kind of punctuation would you use in between. Would it be simply: Why did you do this? Where is he? How could you have ever come up with such a thing? How dare you? Are you completely mad? Or would you use commas or semi-colons in between, or maybe something else? You would need the question marks.

The other question I have is:

Say you had a book with a multitude of chapters. And the main ones, of which there are 4, were all written in uppercase. What about the rest then? Would you write the chapters using the capitals rules for titles, or would you use capitals only for the first word of the chapter title? I've noticed books had descrepancies on this subject - maybe there's a difference between AmE and BrE? The way in which Chapter and Part titles are presented in books is generally the decision of the publisher's production and editorial departments. Authors may indicate a preference, but not generally. How you write them in your manuscript is entirely your decision and there is no right or wrong way.

Thanks a bunch!