The Oxford Guide to Style

This is advertised as 'Hart's Rules for the 21st Century' - but it completely transcends the original in scope and depth. It covers everything writers and editors could possibly want to know about preparing text for publication - in print or on screen. The editor R.M.Ritter has followed the pattern set by Judith Butcher's excellent Copy-Editing for Editors, Authors and Publishers.

He starts from 'parts of the book' then moves on to punctuation, names, capitals, and numbers. He covers all other aspects of text presentation - such as how you should deal with music, mathematics, quotations, lists, tables, and even illustrations. There is a special section on foreign languages which begins with the thorny issue of UK and American English.




As a work of reference, it's readable and user-friendly. The text has been set in a legible font (Swift) with headings in Arial bold, and I think a little extra line-spacing has been used - because it does not have the oppressively dense pages of most books of this kind. It also covers languages such as Latin, European, Asiatic, Classical, and even Sanskrit.

Works such as this reveal the small but important conventions which academics, journalists, and professional writers need to know - but which are hard to remember. How do you punctuate a reference given in a footnote for instance? How are abbreviations shown in foreign languages? Where do spaces go when showing degrees of temperature?

The later parts of the book deal with special subjects - such as law, linguistics, plays, religious works, and translations. Science and Mathematics covers issues such as astronomy, chemical elements, and how to present formulae. Other topics in this section include linguistics and phonetics, translations, audio and visual broadcasts, and electronic data. It also incorporates the most recent changes in citing digital media, and details on the submission of materials for publication.

Finally, it covers the academically complex issues of references, citations, and bibliography. The different systems of author-date and author-title are covered; there are even sections on copyright and permissions; and it concludes with guidance on indexing.

This is an elegant companion to the editor's other Oxford Reference, the Dictionary for Writers and Editors. It's a major guide to style and editing for writers, editors, publishers, and anyone concerned with the finer points of how text is presented on page and on screen. And at today's prices, it's pretty good value.