The Unexpected to Expect

This is a page for new proofreaders to help them feel more comfortable with our texts. There are many things that our texts contain that because of their age, you may not see in more modern texts. The guidelines touch on some of them and this is to provide a bit more detail. As the guidelines note, ignore all italic and bold text while proofing.

These are things that you do not need to leave notes about in the text.

Exclamation Points and Question/Interrogation Marks in the Middle of Sentences

Although you won't see it often now, having ! or ? in the middle of a sentence followed by a word in lowercase is not unusual.

Unusual Spellings, Hyphenations and Phrases You've Never Heard

We have a page (Archaic Spellings) dedicated to listing odd spellings and hyphenations that we've come across, words like "skilful" which is correct. It is by no means an exhaustive list. It could even be the name of the city you live in that is not spelled the way you'd spell it. For example, "Pittsburgh" is spelled correctly both with and without the final "h." Shakespeare spelled his own name many different ways, so don't be surprised when you find it as Shakespear, Shakspear, Shakespere. For all of these and more, match whichever the original image shows.

Closing Quotation Marks

Punctuation In or Out?

Different conventions have been used in different times and in different places. Sometimes the punctuation (.,:;) is within the quotation mark and sometimes it is after the closing quotation mark. Match whichever the original image shows.

No Closing Quotation Mark at All

If the speaker continues speaking for longer than a single paragraph, then the final quotation mark will not appear until the speaker finishes talking. At times, this will be pages after the start of the quotation. Each new paragraph will have an opening quotation mark, but no closing one until the final paragraph. This is not just an older book's convention, but is actually correct grammar. Sometimes, it isn't noticed until proofreading.

Advertising Pages and Book List Pages

Many of our books and periodicals will have multiple pages of advertising for the publisher's other books or actual advertisements for products. We keep them all. Proof just the words and let the Formatters decide how to mark them up.

Very often book lists give us ideas of other books to run through DP. They've also been used to verify copyright or help with another advertisement with less clear print. Rarely will you see a page as chock full of text as the Pansy advertiser above. Usually it will be cut up into smaller pieces to make proofing and formatting easier. This is just to give you an idea of what you might see.

Symbols

The British pound sign may be shown in the text as £ before the number or l. (lower case L, with or without the period/fullstop) after the number. (£26 or 26l or 26l) Proof them just as shown. If your keyboard doesn't have a £, a copy of it can be found in the character picker on the lower left of your proofing interface under the ¶. Under that same ¶ you will find mathematical symbols, the paragraph mark ¶, the section symbol §, the degree °, etc. Proof those just as they are seen, except the fractions. Fractions (½) are proofed as 1/2 or for 1½, proof as 1-1/2. This is because only three fractions are available in our character set. (¼, ½, and ¾) Therefore all fractions are proofed full-size with the /.

Additionally, if you are working on a very old text indeed, you may run across some rare symbols and ligatures. Proofing old texts is a page that lists many of them with instructions on how to proof them.

Etc.

Et cetera is shown many different ways in our texts. Etc., etc., &c. and so on. Proof it as it is printed. Check the Proofing old texts page for different ways that the ampersand may show up. Watch for and note any missing periods/fullstops. Etc[**.]

Proofing Already Done

BEGIN projects are not pre-processed very much. Things that can be handled fairly well automatically are left to the newest proofers to give them practice in how we proof our pages. Usually though, with the BEGIN exception, our books will already have most words split at the end of lines reattached, most headers and footers removed and most em-dashes clothed.

Spaces in Abbreviations or Initials

Many of our abbreviations and initials are spaced in the original text. (U. S. A., Y. M. C. A.) Some are not. Whichever way the original presents it, proof it that way. If it has spaces, leave spaces. If there are no spaces, leave no spaces.

Offensive Material

You are going to come across it. Or at least things that we would consider racism, sexism, etc. today. There will be broad stereotypes, bad dialect, untrue statements, things that are graphic in nature, things that may make you very angry. Remember that we are preserving history as it was written and some of it was very ugly. If something offends you, there is nothing wrong with returning the page to round and choosing a different project to work on.