Forum: Author Hangout

Bibliography formatting

Vincent Berg 🚫

I've got a bibliography formatting question that's a bit vexing. It's a newspaper article, taken from their online website, which attributes a work to someone as related by their wife long after their death, but the article is by someone else entirely. How the frig does one format this?

Normally, I list "author firstname lastname, book title (date)." The APA specifies "author lastname, first initial, middle initial, Article Title, Newspaper, retrieved from newspaper website (date).

The quote I'm trying to attribute is:

T. S. Eliot, "Valerie Eliot's death deprived poetry of its strongest advocate" by David Morley, The Guardian, retrieved from www.theguardian.com (Nov. 13, 2012).

So how do you attribute someone reporting on someone else quoting a long-dead their party? As far as I can tell, this is the only known citation for this quote.

By the way, the APA is simply the first source that popped up during a search, but I'm NOT writing a newspaper article, so it's rules don't apply.

Replies: Ross at Play REP

PrincelyGuy 🚫

I would just attribute it to the newspaper. The problem from there is theirs. From my prior life we would often cite references back to other works and some of those would include references to other works. No reason to fill your story with attributions to numerous cites when only one would be sufficient.

Just my opinion. And I apologize for being wordy. Sometimes I get a little preachy.

Replies: Vincent Berg

Vincent Berg 🚫
Updated:

@PrincelyGuy

I would just attribute it to the newspaper. The problem from there is theirs. From my prior life we would often cite references back to other works and some of those would include references to other works. No reason to fill your story with attributions to numerous cites when only one would be sufficient.

Thanks. My main problem was how to format the article title and weblink, since I had no clue which should be italicized or put into quotes. Simply listing the newspaper.

My new source reference reads:

Eliot, T. S. "Valerie Eliot's death deprived poetry of its strongest advocate" by David Morley, The Guardian (Nov. 13, 2012).

Replies: Ross at Play

Ross at Play 🚫
Updated:

@Vincent Berg

My new source reference reads:
Eliot, T. S. "Valerie Eliot's death deprived poetry of its strongest advocate" by David Morley, The Guardian (Nov. 13, 2012).

I think that's okay, although I might consider adding an explanatory note.

It's not up to you to prove that Eliot actually said the words you "quote". The purpose of the reference is to identify the source you relied upon so that others may assess its credibility for themselves. What you have would achieve that adequately.

Keet 🚫
Updated:

As a reader I rarely consult references but when I do it is because I want to know more about the subject or actually want to verify the legitimacy of a statement. If your reference achieves the purpose in pointing me to that then it is good in my view, even if I have to dig deeper in the mentioned reference to look up further references.

Replies: Vincent Berg

Vincent Berg 🚫

@Keet

As a reader I rarely consult references but when I do it is because I want to know more about the subject or actually want to verify the legitimacy of a statement. If your reference achieves the purpose in pointing me to that then it is good in my view, even if I have to dig deeper in the mentioned reference to look up further references.

My main focuses are threefold: first, to acknowledge who actually wrote the quote, validate what was actually said, and then source the quote so that anyone who wishes to use it themselves can correctly attribute it.

In most cases, no one will really care, so they couldn't care less whether I have a bibliography or not, but if they do, my books now contain active links to the source, rather than forcing the reader to stop, go to the Bibliography page and look up the reference. I think that's easier on the reader, without being obnoxious about it (though, it's a well-known fact that many people will not click on any active links, but you can't base your 'product' on luddites! 'D

My biggest concern, though, is the prevelance of 'quotes sites', which typically never authenticate anything, often repharse quotes to make them more pithy, or misattribute quotes to someone who simply repeated a historical quote.

Replies: Keet

Keet 🚫

@Vincent Berg

In most cases, no one will really care, so they couldn't care less whether I have a bibliography or not, but if they do, my books now contain active links to the source, rather than forcing the reader to stop, go to the Bibliography page and look up the reference. I think that's easier on the reader, without being obnoxious about it (though, it's a well-known fact that many people will not click on any active links, but you can't base your 'product' on luddites! 'D

You're right. I don't think it will be a problem for you or the type of stories on this site but try to prevent too many references at the bottom. For me, I don't mind going to a separate references page if I want to check something. Rather that then cluttering references on every page.

My biggest concern, though, is the prevelance of 'quotes sites', which typically never authenticate anything, often repharse quotes to make them more pithy, or misattribute quotes to someone who simply repeated a historical quote.

Only one way to solve that: check/validate every reference yourself. Yeah I know, it's a pain.

Ross at Play 🚫

@Vincent Berg

How the frig does one format this?

I assume you want to "quote" T.S. Eliot in an epigraph at the beginning of a chapter ...

I would suggest the epigraph should indicate the words are attributed to T.S. Eliot rather than a direct quote, like this:

The words you want to quote
-- attributed to T.S. Eliot

The reference should be something like this:

T.S. Eliot, attributed to by:
David Morley, "Valerie Eliot's death deprived poetry of its strongest advocate", retrieved from www.theguardian.com (Nov. 13, 2012).

Note the standard format of the reference to the actual article you are quoting.

Then you would still need a note clarifying that the article reports on an interview Eliot's sister had with a journalist in which [she claimed] she provided direct quotes of words Eliot had said to her.

Phew!

Replies: Vincent Berg

Vincent Berg 🚫

@Ross at Play

Then you would still need a note clarifying that the article reports on an interview Eliot's sister had with a journalist in which [she claimed] she provided direct quotes of words Eliot had said to her.

Actually it was his wife, finally verifying a quote which had long been attributed to him, in an article memorializing her death, 50 years after his death. However, there's no reference to when she originally identified his quotation, making the entire thing even more circuitous. However, I think the title of the article fairly well summarizes who said what and under what circumstances.

I'd been trying to correctly source this quote for the past three years with no success until recently. :(

REP 🚫

@Vincent Berg

I would just attribute it to the newspaper.

PrincelyGuy suggested the above and I agree with him.

Your description of who said what to whom and when seems to be undocumented by anything other than verbal statements. Verbal statements made without a witness are often questioned.

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Bibliography formatting

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