Re: French group separators

From: Michael Everson (everson@evertype.com)
Date: Mon Jul 07 2003 - 16:21:51 EDT

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     From Robert Bringhurst's Elements of Typographic Style, pp. 28-20:

    "Use a single word space between sentences. In the nineteenth
    century, which was a dark and inflationary age in typography and type
    design, many compositors were encouraged to stuff extra space between
    sentences. Generations of twentieth-century typists were then taught
    to do the same, by hitting the spacebar twice after every period.
    Your typing as well as your typesetting will benefit from unlearning
    this quaint Victorian habit. As a general rule, no more than a single
    space is required after a period, or any other mark of punctuation.
    Larger spaces (e.g., en spaces) are *themselves* punctuation.

    "The rule is usually altered, however, when setting classical Latin
    and Greek, romanized Sanskrit, phonetics, or other kinds of texts in
    which sentences begin with lowercase letters. In the absence of a
    capital, a full *en space* (M/2) between sentences will generally be
    welcome."

    -- 
    Michael Everson * * Everson Typography *  * http://www.evertype.com
    


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