Bold or unbold that is the question

[dh@uc]

Please see the example.

August — the hottest month of the summer.

If August was bold, would the dash be bold as well?

[mac.FINN]

I think that'd be a matter of personal preference... I wouldn't bold it though.

[morea]

I just wrote an article with a similar setup, and I didn't make the dashes bold... but I can't point you to a rule of typography that says whether that is actually correct or not. Anybody? Bueller?

[Riya]

Ohh, an english major question! Not bold, though it's really a stylistic thing. Oh, and take out the spaces on either side of the dash too. They shouldn't be there.

[Craig B]

I get into fights with my proofreader/editor at work about spaces on either side of the dash ... I know that they shouldn't be there, but I do it because it aids legibility and it looks better.

I also would vote for not bolding the dash.

[Crimson]

You should should make the dash an italic!



......snicker.........

[hewligan]

I get into fights with my proofreader/editor at work about spaces on either side of the dash ... I know that they shouldn't be there, but I do it because it aids legibility and it looks better.

I also would vote for not bolding the dash.

The dash thing depends. Strictly it should be an em-dash with no spaces, but a lot of people - myself included - prefer an en-dash with spaces these days. If you have an em-dash, definitely no spaces.

And not bold.

[Broacher]

The 'space-space' is a constant battle for me, as well. In some faces, I do insert a thinspace if necessary - especially if it's in a head. It's another one of those typewriter-legacies that we still live with. Like two spaces after a period.

[Virgo Nightingale]

I wouldn't bold the dash. Personally, I don't apply whatever style to an item of punctuation unless the whole sentence has the same style applied to it. As far as spaces around a dash line, I've gotten so accustomed to seeing them with no spaces around them that when I do, it looks really weird to me. There are also different ways to treat punctuation depending on the language. I was doing a French translation of a training manual and in the text sent to me, there was a space before every colon. I took them all out thinking that the person typing just thought it looked better, but they had me put them all back in. Apparently in French, it's proper to put spaces before the colons.

[budafist]

Not bold. The bold is for the header, the dash is part of the next section.

[morea]

found the "rule" for this, as per "The Elements of Typographic Style" by Robert Bringhurst:

"When boldface is used to emphasize words, it is usually best to leave the punctuation in the background, which is to say, in the basic text font. It is the words, not the punctuation, that merit emphasis in a sequence such as the following:

... on the islands of Lombok, Bali, Flores, Timor and Sulawesi, the same textiles...

But if the same names are emphasized by setting them in italic rather than bold, there is no advantage in leaving the punctuation in roman. With italic text, italic punctuation normally gives better letterfit and thus looks less obtrusive:

... on the islands of Lombok, Bali, Flores, Timor and Sulawesi, the same textiles..."

[Ned]

You know what they say...

Why bold, when you can black?




(no really... they say that, don't they?)

[budafist]

Who's is they and why are they always saying stuff?

[hewligan]

It's the aliens, of course.

They say these things to control our brains. That's why I never leave the house without my tinfoil hat.