Need formatting advice

[maldoror_chant]

This would be for the Supernatural fandom, so EVERYTHING is going to sound weird in the next few minutes. Because Supernatural just rolls that way. But even if you're not into that fandom, I think the formatting side of the question should still make sense.

So, Cas is stuck as a passenger in Dean's head (yes, this is a thing that can actually happen in the series itself, theoretically) for a short term, which means that Dean is speaking, Cas is replying in a voice that seems to be coming from inside Dean's head like a tiny radio receiver inside his skull. Since nobody else can hear him, I do want to not use " for Cas's speech. I played around with single quotes, but it looked average. Right now I have pipes | in play. It'll read something like this (not actual dialogue):

Dean whacked a bush with his machete. "I hate this."

|I know, but as you are fond of saying, 'handle the cards you deal with',| Cas sighed.

"...That's not the right expression."

(The example shows why single quotes don't work well; it got confusing when Cas was quoting or when a possessive ' was in play)


Okay, that's the first stage. HOWEVER it gets more complicated because, being mentally linked, they have subconscious thoughts leaking through to each other. And that's where my formatting started to break down. There are no Rules of Punctuation for this situation. I've been using (thought) with little punctuation and no caps to give an impression of uninterrupted train of thought.


Dean whacked a bush with his machete. "I hate this." (this is like getting celestially roofied)

|I know, but as you are fond of saying, 'handle the cards you deal with',| Cas sighed. (it's no easier for me)

"...That's not the right expression." (He can speak any language under the sun but not plain English.)

(yes I can speak speak any language true but colloquialisms change every minute and make no sense)


This is what it looks like for short sentence dialogue...however, when it's a long monologue frequently interrupted by subconscious interjection, the succession of pipes and parentheses are dizzying. I was tempted to insert the (subthoughts) into the dialogue, but that made no sense for Dean. He's speaking 90% of his conscious words out loud.

Example of headachy long monologue (actual dialogue with some bits removed to avoid spoilers):

|But she has a strong ethos in these matters - when she doesn’t feel they need to be subverted for a greater cause. Besides, as far as I am concerned the same thing applies,| Castiel said with an edge. |And she knows that. She's smart. I still have friends in the Host, they keep me informed. Some in the upper echelons have asked her why she puts up with our presence.| (as we are nothing more than a rogue angel and two pathetic fragile humans) |It seems she talked them around to her view of things.| (she gave them a day-long presentation of what she called our ‘frightful highlights’) |She convinced them that we are safer left alone than harmed.| (as otherwise we will do great harm in return, whether it be by design, by luck or by sheer accident while flailing about, and then nobody could safely contain the resulting mess) |Um, that was what she said. If you overheard that.|

There are not many monologues like this, really, but if I could find a better solution that works both for short and long dialogue, that'd be sooooo nice ^^;


So yeah. Any suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated, because the fic is 90% finished, is already some 31 pages long, and every time I change my mind on how to format the dialogue/thought/subthought, it's so. Much. Editing.........

Comments

[the_rck]

When I'm writing deliberate mental communication, I usually italicize it and put '//' before and after the deliberate parts. Doubling the punctuation catches the eye a bit more than anything alone because it's unexpected and breaks the visual pattern.

So maybe double piping and parentheses?

I'm thinking back to 18 years ago and the large number of Weiss Kreuz fics that had keys in the author's note to explain which types of communication/non-communication were which. I know people mocked those, but it gets complicated.

[maldoror_chant]

Doh, I should have thought of that, I'm using // right now for an old fic I'm posting. I think the slashes work better than pipes, as pipes tend to visually confuse with capital i and lower case l. Jainas suggested *, which might work well too. It's less visually heavy, which is both an advantage and disadvantage. Thanks :) *ponders*

[jainas]

Actually (thought) seems a bit overkill as you have both the italics and the () as a signifier for the same thing...

And maybe ** or // would be better than |... Visually * has the advantage of looking a bit like ", so it would be easier to parse as some form of speech for the reader?

*But she has a strong ethos in these matters - when she doesn’t feel they need to be subverted for a greater cause. Besides, as far as I am concerned the same thing applies*, Castiel said with an edge. *And she knows that. She's smart. I still have friends in the Host, they keep me informed. Some in the upper echelons have asked her why she puts up with our presence...* as we are nothing more than a rogue angel and two pathetic fragile humans... *It seems she talked them around to her view of things.* she gave them a day-long presentation of what she called our ‘frightful highlights’ *She convinced them that we are safer left alone than harmed.* as otherwise we will do great harm in return, whether it be by design, by luck or by sheer accident while flailing about, and then nobody could safely contain the resulting mess... *Um, that was what she said. If you overheard that.*

[maldoror_chant]

I actually like the asterix idea, it's less heavy-looking than the pipes. I did contemplate dropping the parentheses already, but some paragraphs got rather confusing. I might try again though, italics and () do make it look heavy.

[maldoror_chant]

Italics and () together are probably too much, now I'm hesitating between one and the other - especially since dumping those heavy pipes makes it visually less aggravating to keep the (). Italics can be harder to distinguish at times, I find, and the () makes it more like something that is in the background.

*What? Dean, no-* (yes) *...this is irritating.*

*What? Dean, no-* yes *...this is irritating.*

Not sure which works best.

[schneefink]

I think it's clear. (I often see telepathy being written in italics, which I like, but then here the distinction to the leaked thoughts is a little less obvious.) In the long monologue, the places where the | and parentheses meet seem a bit overkill; since it's one long otherwise uninterrupted speech, what if you simply remove the pipes in the middle? It reads a bit different to me, less like Castiel is pausing between what he is saying while the thoughts leak through and that it happens more unconsciously/at the same time:

|But she has a strong ethos in these matters - when she doesn’t feel they need to be subverted for a greater cause. Besides, as far as I am concerned the same thing applies,| Castiel said with an edge. |And she knows that. She's smart. I still have friends in the Host, they keep me informed. Some in the upper echelons have asked her why she puts up with our presence. (as we are nothing more than a rogue angel and two pathetic fragile humans) It seems she talked them around to her view of things. (she gave them a day-long presentation of what she called our ‘frightful highlights’) She convinced them that we are safer left alone than harmed. (as otherwise we will do great harm in return, whether it be by design, by luck or by sheer accident while flailing about, and then nobody could safely contain the resulting mess) Um, that was what she said. If you overheard that.|

[maldoror_chant]

Actually your comment made me think of handling the few monologues I have in a different way altogether, which avoids many pitfalls. THough if I do decide to keep it as such, I might go for that formatting just for htis monologue; technically incorrect compared to the rest, but much more readable. *ponders*