WRITING LESSON: Punctuating Titles -- When to Use Italics, Underlining, and Quotation Marks.

It's easy for students to forget that different types of titles require different typographical features. It is even harder to remember which type of title requires which type of punctuation.

Despair not! If you remember these two handy
rules, you can keep the difference straight:
1) Short works and parts of long works are usually in quotation marks.
2) Long works and collections of short works are usually underlined or put in italics.

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1) "Title of a Short Poem."
Title of an Epic Poem or Book-Length Poem
Ex: "The Raven."
Ex: The Odyssey

2) "Title of a Short Story."
Title of a Novel
Ex: "Young Goodman Brown"
Ex: The Scarlet Letter

3) "Title of an Essay"
Title of a Collection or Anthology of Essays
Ex: "The Fiction of Langston Hughes"
Ex: Modern Writers and Their Readers

4) "Title of a Short Song"
Title of a CD, Cassette, or Album
Ex: "Money Talks"
Ex: The Razor's Edge, by AC/DC.
Also: Title of a Ballet or Opera
Ex: The Nutcracker Suite or Die Fliedermaus
Also: Title of Long Classical or Instrumental Compositions
Identified by Name, Rather than Number.
Ex: Wagner's The Flight of the Valkyries

5) "Title of a Skit or Monologue"
Title of a Play
Ex: "Madman's Lament"
Ex: The Importance of Being Ernest

6) "Short Commercial"
Title of a Film
"Obey Your Thirst."
Ex: Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones

7) Title of "Individual Episode" in a
Title of a Television Series as a Whole
Television Series.
Ex: The Simpsons
"The Trouble With Tribbles"
Ex: Star Trek

8) "Title of a Chapter in a Book"
Title of a Complete Book
Ex: "Welsh Mountains"
Ex: A Guide to Welsh Geography

9) "Encyclopedia Article"
Title of Encyclopedia
Ex: "Etruscan"
Ex: Encyclopedia Brittanica

10) "Title of an Article in a Magazine"
Title of the Magazine.
Ex: "Training Your Toddler"
Ex: Parenting

11) "Title of an Article in a Newspaper"
Title of the Newspaper
Ex: "Man Kills Seven in Subway"
Ex: The New York Times

12) "One or Two Page Handout"
Pamphlet
Ex: "Old English Verbs: A One Page Guide"
Ex: The Coming Kingdom of God and the Millennium.