an essay do you underline poem titles

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What about MLA format?

All research papers on literature use MLA format, as it is the universal citation method for the field of literary studies. Whenever you use a primary or secondary source, whether you are quoting or paraphrasing, you will make parenthetical citations in the MLA format [Ex. (Smith 67).] Your Works Cited list will be the last page of your essay. Consult the OWL handout on MLA for further instructions.

Note, however, the following minor things about MLA format:

• Titles of books, plays, or works published singularly (not anthologized) should be italicised unless it is a handwritten document, in which case underlining is acceptable. (Ex. Hamlet , Great Expectations )
• Titles of poems, short stories, or works published in an anthology will have quotation marks around them. (Ex. "Ode to a Nightingale," "The Cask of Amontillado")

Tip If you're using Microsoft Word, you can easily include your name and page number on each page by following the these steps:

• Open "View" (on the top menu).
• Open "Header and Footer." (A box will appear at the top of the page you're on. And a "Header and Footer" menu box will also appear).
• Click on the "align right" button at the top of the screen. (If you're not sure which button it is, hold the mouse over the buttons and a small window should pop up telling you which button you're on.)
• Type in your last name and a space.
• Click on the "#" button which is located on the "Header and Footer" menu box. It will insert the appropriate page number.
• Click "Close" on the "Header and Footer" window.

That's all you need to do. Word will automatically insert your name and the page number on every page of your document.

What else should I remember?

• Don't leave a quote or paraphrase by itself-you must introduce it, explain it, and show how it relates to your thesis.
• Block format all quotations of more than four lines.
• When you quote brief passages of poetry, line and stanza divisions are shown as a slash (Ex. "Roses are red, / Violets are blue / You love me / And I like you").
• For more help, see the OWL handout on using quotes .

• How to Cite
• Language & Lit
• Rhyme & Rhythm
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How to Reference a Poem Title in an Essay

Whether you are writing an essay about a poet or simply quoting a poem or referring to its themes, you may find yourself needing to reference the poem's title. However, it can be hard to remember whether the title is italicized, underlined or put into quotation marks. Although the treatment varies depending on the length of the poem and the format you are using, you can follow some general rules for citing poem titles in your paper.

Write the title of the poem in title case. All of the words should be capitalized except articles ("a," "an" or "the"), short prepositions ("in," "on," "with," "at") or coordinating conjunctions ("but," "and," "nor," "or," "so").

Put quotation marks around the poem's title unless it is a novel-length epic poem, such as "Paradise Lost" or "The Divine Comedy." In that case, italicize or underline the title.

Cite the poem with a parenthetical citation if you are using MLA or APA format. For MLA format, write the poet's last name and the page number from which you drew the specific portion of the poem you are citing. If you are citing specific lines, include those after the page number: (Frost 16, lines 23-26). For APA format, write the author's name, the year of publication and the page number from which you drew the information preceded by "p.": (Frost, 1997, p. 16). Do not include a page number if you are citing a website unless you are citing a PDF or another website that includes page numbers.

Create a footnote if you are using Chicago format. Write the poet's last name, the title of the poem, the name of the poem's anthology or the website from which you drew the poem, and the anthology or website's editor. Include the publisher, year and location of publication if you are citing a print poem and the URL and date of retrieval if you are citing a website. Place the page number and any specific lines from which you drew the information at the end of this footnote.

If you are citing an epic or classic poem, cite the canto, act and scene or book instead of the page number:

Yeats, William Butler, "When You Are Old," in Selected Poems: Fourth Edition, ed. M. L. Rosenthal (New York: Scribner Paperback Poetry, 1996),14, line 5.

Dante, "The Divine Comedy: Purgatorio," trans. John D. Sinclair (London, Oxford University Press, 1961), Canto XXVII, lines 34-36.

Dickinson, Emily, "I Heard A Fly Buzz," Women's Studies Database Reading Room at the University of Maryland, n.d., http://www.mith2.umd.edu/WomensStudies/ReadingRoom/Poetry/Dickinson/i-heard-a-fly-buzz (accessed April 21, 2011).

Bibliography

Cite the poem in your bibliography according to the format you are using in the rest of the essay. For MLA format, include the author's last and first name, the title of the poem in quotation marks, the italicized title of the poem's anthology, the page number of the poem and the anthology's editor, date and place of publication and publisher. If the poem is a novel-length poem contained within a single volume, cite it as you would a novel.

If you found the poem online, cite it as you would any other website, including your date of access. Write "n.d." if no publication date is available.

Cite a short poem like this:

Yeats, William Butler. "When You Are Old." Selected Poems: Fourth Edition. Ed. M. L. Rosenthal. New York: Scribner Paperback Poetry, 1996.14.

Cite a long poem like this:

Virgil. The Aeneid. Trans. Robert Fitzgerald. New York: Vintage Classics. 1990.

Cite an online poem like this:

Dickinson, Emily. "I Heard a Fly Buzz." Women's Studies Database Reading Room at the University of Maryland. n.d. Web. 21 April 2011.

Cite the poet, date of publication, poem title, editor, anthology name, page number and date and location of publication for APA format. Cite a long poem as you would a novel. Cite a poem you found online with the poet's name, the website's editor, the name of the website, the retrieval date and the URL.

Yeats, William Butler (1996) When you are old. In M.L. Rosenthal (Ed.), Selected poems: fourth edition (p. 14). New York: Scribner Paperback Poetry.

Virgil (1990). The Aeneid. R. Fitzgerald (trans.). New York: Vintage Classics.

Dickinson, Emily (n.d.). I heard a fly buzz. In Women's Studies Database Reading Room at the University of Maryland (ed.), Selected poems by Emily Dickinson. Retrieved April 21, 2011 from http://www.mith2.umd.edu/.

Cite a bibliographic entry for Chicago Manual of Style as you would a footnote, replacing the commas with periods and omitting line numbers.

Virgil. The Aeneid. Translated by Robert Fitzgerald. New York: Vintage Classics, 1990.

Dickinson, Emily. "I Heard a Fly Buzz." Women's Studies Database Reading Room at the University of Maryland, n.d. http://www.mith2.umd.edu/(accessed April 21, 2011).

• Daily Writing Tips: Rules for Capitalization in Titles
• Purdue Online Writing Lab: MLA Works Cited Page: Books
• Purdue Online Writing Lab: MLA Works Cited Page: Electronic Sources

A resident of the Baltimore area, Rachel Kolar has been writing since 2001. Her educational research was featured at the Maryland State Department of Education Professional Schools Development Conference in 2008. Kolar holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from Kenyon College and a Master of Arts in teaching from the College of Notre Dame of Maryland.

Generate accurate MLA citations for free

• Knowledge Base
• MLA titles: Formatting and capitalization rules

MLA Titles | How to Format & Capitalize Source Titles

Published on April 2, 2019 by Courtney Gahan . Revised on March 5, 2024.

In MLA style , source titles appear either in italics or in quotation marks:

• Italicize the title of a self-contained whole (e.g. a book, film, journal, or website).
• Use  quotation marks around the title if it is part of a larger work (e.g. a chapter of a book, an article in a journal, or a page on a website).

All major words in a title are capitalized . The same format is used in the Works Cited list and in the text itself.

When you use the Scribbr MLA Citation Generator , the correct formatting and capitalization are automatically applied to titles.

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Table of contents

Capitalization in mla titles, punctuation in mla titles, titles within titles, exceptions to mla title formatting, sources with no title, abbreviating titles, titles in foreign languages, frequently asked questions about mla titles.

In all titles and subtitles, capitalize the first and last words, as well as any other principal words.

What to capitalize

What not to capitalize

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Use the same punctuation as appears in the source title. However, if there is a subtitle, separate it from the main title with a colon and a space, even if different (or no) punctuation is used in the source.

Example of a work with a subtitle

The exception is when the title ends in a question mark, exclamation point or dash, in which case you keep the original punctuation:

Sometimes a title contains another title—for example, the title of an article about a novel might contain that novel’s title.

For titles within titles, in general, maintain the same formatting as you would if the title stood on its own.

Titles and names that fall into the following categories are not italicized or enclosed in quotation marks:

• Scripture (e.g. the Bible, the Koran, the Gospel)
• Laws, acts and related documents (e.g. the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution , the Paris Agreement)
• Musical compositions identified by form, number and key (e.g. Beethoven’s Symphony no. 5 in C minor, op. 67)
• Conferences, seminars, workshops and courses (e.g. MLA Annual Convention)

Sections of a work

Words that indicate a particular section of a work are not italicized or placed within quotation marks. They are also not capitalized when mentioned in the text.

Examples of such sections include:

• introduction
• list of works cited
• bibliography

Introductions, prefaces, forewords and afterwords

Descriptive terms such as “introduction”, “preface”, “foreword” and “afterword” are capitalized if mentioned in an MLA in-text citation or in the Works Cited list, but not when mentioned in the text itself.

Example of descriptive term capitalization

In-text citation: (Brontë, Preface )

In text: In her preface to the work, added in a later edition, Brontë debates the morality of creating characters such as those featured in Wuthering Heights .

If there is a unique title for the introduction, preface, foreword or afterword, include that title in quotation marks instead of the generic section name when referencing the source in the Works Cited list or an in-text citation.

Prevent plagiarism. Run a free check.

For sources with no title, a brief description of the source acts as the title.

Example of a source reference with no title

Follow these rules for capitalization:

• Capitalize the first word
• Capitalize proper nouns
• Ignore other MLA rules for capitalization

There are some exceptions to this general format: descriptions including titles of other works, such as comments on articles or reviews of movies; untitled short messages, like tweets; email messages; and untitled poems.

Exceptions to general format for sources with no title

If you need to mention the name of a work in the text itself, state the full title, but omit the subtitle.

If you need to refer to the work multiple times, you may shorten the title to something familiar or obvious to the reader. For example, Huckleberry Finn for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn . If in doubt, prefer the noun phrase.

If the standalone abbreviation may not be clear, you can introduce it in parentheses, following the standard guidelines for abbreviations. For example, The Merchant of Venice ( MV ) . For Shakespeare and the Bible , there are well-established abbreviations you can use.

When you abbreviate a title, make sure you keep the formatting consistent. Even if the abbreviation consists only of letters, as in the MV example, it must be italicized or placed within quotation marks in the same way as it would be when written in full.

Abbreviating very long titles in the Works Cited list

Titles should normally be given in full in the Works Cited list, but if any of your sources has a particularly long title (often the case with older works), you can use an ellipsis to shorten it here. This is only necessary with extremely long titles such as the example below.

In the Works Cited list, if you are listing a work with a title in a language other than English, you can add the translated title in square brackets.

Example of a reference with a translated title

If you are using the foreign-language title in the text itself, you can also include the translation in parenthesis. For example, O Alquimista ( The Alchemist ) .

You don’t need to include a translation in your reference list or in the text if you expect your readers to be familiar with the original language. For example, you wouldn’t translate the title of a  French novel you were writing about in the context of a French degree.

Non-Latin script languages

For works in a language that does not use the Latin alphabet, such as Arabic, Chinese, Greek, Hebrew, Japanese, or Russian, be consistent with how you mention the source titles and also quotations from within them.

For example, if you choose to write a Russian title in the Cyrillic form, do that throughout the document. If you choose to use the Romanized form, stick with that. Do not alternate between the two.

Yes. MLA style uses title case, which means that all principal words (nouns, pronouns , verbs, adjectives , adverbs , and some conjunctions ) are capitalized.

This applies to titles of sources as well as the title of, and subheadings in, your paper. Use MLA capitalization style even when the original source title uses different capitalization .

In MLA style , book titles appear in italics, with all major words capitalized. If there is a subtitle, separate it from the main title with a colon and a space (even if no colon appears in the source). For example:

The format is the same in the Works Cited list and in the text itself. However, when you mention the book title in the text, you don’t have to include the subtitle.

The title of a part of a book—such as a chapter, or a short story or poem in a collection—is not italicized, but instead placed in quotation marks.

When a book’s chapters are written by different authors, you should cite the specific chapter you are referring to.

When all the chapters are written by the same author (or group of authors), you should usually cite the entire book, but some styles include exceptions to this.

• In APA Style , single-author books should always be cited as a whole, even if you only quote or paraphrase from one chapter.
• In MLA Style , if a single-author book is a collection of stand-alone works (e.g. short stories ), you should cite the individual work.
• In Chicago Style , you may choose to cite a single chapter of a single-author book if you feel it is more appropriate than citing the whole book.

The title of an article is not italicized in MLA style , but placed in quotation marks. This applies to articles from journals , newspapers , websites , or any other publication. Use italics for the title of the source where the article was published. For example:

Use the same formatting in the Works Cited entry and when referring to the article in the text itself.

The MLA Handbook is currently in its 9th edition , published in 2021.

This quick guide to MLA style  explains the latest guidelines for citing sources and formatting papers according to MLA.

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Poetry Explained

How to Write a Poetry Essay (Complete Guide)

Unlock success in poetry essays with our comprehensive guide. Uncover the process to help aid understanding of how best to create a poetry essay.

While many of us read poetry for pleasure, it is undeniable that many poetry readers do so in the knowledge that they will be assessed on the text they are reading, either in an exam, for homework, or for a piece of coursework. This is clearly a daunting task for many, and lots of students don’t even know where to begin. We’re here to help! This guide will take you through all the necessary steps so that you can plan and write great poetry essays every time. If you’re still getting to grips with the different techniques, terms, or some other aspect of poetry, then check out our other available resources at the bottom of this page.

This Guide was Created by Joe Samantaria

Degree in English and Related Literature, and a Masters in Irish Literature

Upon completion of his degrees, Joe is an English tutor and counts W.B. Yeats , Emily Brontë , and Federico Garcia Lorca among his favorite poets. He has helped tutor hundreds of students with poetry and aims to do the same for readers and Poetry + users on Poem Analysis.

How to Write a Poetry Essay

• 1 Before You Start…
• 2 Introductions
• 3 Main Paragraphs
• 4 Conclusions
• 6 Other Resources

Before You Start…

Before we begin, we must address the fact that all poetry essays are different from one another on account of different academic levels, whether or not the essay pertains to one poem or multiple, and the intended length of the essay. That is before we even contend with the countless variations and distinctions between individual poems. Thus, it is impossible to produce a single, one-size-fits-all template for writing great essays on poetry because the criteria for such an essay are not universal. This guide is, therefore, designed to help you go about writing a simple essay on a single poem, which comes to roughly 1000-1200 words in length. We have designed it this way to mirror the requirements of as many students around the world as possible. It is our intention to write another guide on how to write a comparative poetry essay at a later date. Finally, we would like to stress the fact that this guide is exactly that: a guide. It is not a set of restrictive rules but rather a means of helping you get to grips with writing poetry essays. Think of it more like a recipe that, once practiced a few times, can be modified and adapted as you see fit.

The first and most obvious starting point is the poem itself and there are some important things to do at this stage before you even begin contemplating writing your essay. Naturally, these things will depend on the nature of the essay you are required to write.

• Is the poem one you are familiar with?
• Do you know anything about the context of the poem or the poet?
• How much time do you have to complete the essay?
• Do you have access to books or the internet?

These questions matter because they will determine the type, length, and scope of the essay you write. Naturally, an essay written under timed conditions about an unfamiliar poem will look very different from one written about a poem known to you. Likewise, teachers and examiners will expect different things from these essays and will mark them accordingly.

As this article pertains to writing a poverty essay, we’re going to assume you have a grasp of the basics of understanding the poems themselves. There is a plethora of materials available that can help you analyze poetry if you need to, and thousands of analyzed poems are available right here. For the sake of clarity, we advise you to use these tools to help you get to grips with the poem you intend to write about before you ever sit down to actually produce an essay. As we have said, the amount of time spent pondering the poem will depend on the context of the essay. If you are writing a coursework-style question over many weeks, then you should spend hours analyzing the poem and reading extensively about its context. If, however, you are writing an essay in an exam on a poem you have never seen before, you should perhaps take 10-15% of the allotted time analyzing the poem before you start writing.

The Question

Once you have spent enough time analyzing the poem and identifying its key features and themes, you can turn your attention to the question. It is highly unlikely that you will simply be asked to “analyze this poem.” That would be too simple on the one hand and far too broad on the other.

More likely, you will be asked to analyze a particular aspect of the poem, usually pertaining to its message, themes, or meaning. There are numerous ways examiners can express these questions, so we have outlined some common types of questions below.

• Explore the poet’s presentation of…
• How does the poet present…
• Explore the ways the writer portrays their thoughts about…

These are all similar ways of achieving the same result. In each case, the examiner requires that you analyze the devices used by the poet and attempt to tie the effect those devices have to the poet’s broader intentions or meaning.

Some students prefer reading the question before they read the poem, so they can better focus their analytical eye on devices and features that directly relate to the question they are being asked. This approach has its merits, especially for poems that you have not previously seen. However, be wary of focusing too much on a single element of a poem, particularly if it is one you may be asked to write about again in a later exam. It is no good knowing only how a poem links to the theme of revenge if you will later be asked to explore its presentation of time.

Essay plans can help focus students’ attention when they’re under pressure and give them a degree of confidence while they’re writing. In basic terms, a plan needs the following elements:

• An overarching answer to the question (this will form the basis of your introduction)
• A series of specific, identifiable poetic devices ( metaphors , caesura , juxtaposition , etc) you have found in the poem
• Ideas about how these devices link to the poem’s messages or themes.
• Some pieces of relevant context (depending on whether you need it for your type of question)

In terms of layout, we do not want to be too prescriptive. Some students prefer to bullet-point their ideas, and others like to separate them by paragraph. If you use the latter approach, you should aim for:

• 1 Introduction
• 4-5 Main paragraphs
• 1 Conclusion

Finally, the length and detail of your plan should be dictated by the nature of the essay you are doing. If you are under exam conditions, you should not spend too much time writing a plan, as you will need that time for the essay itself. Conversely, if you are not under time pressure, you should take your time to really build out your plan and fill in the details.

Introductions

If you have followed all the steps to this point, you should be ready to start writing your essay. All good essays begin with an introduction, so that is where we shall start.

When it comes to introductions, the clue is in the name: this is the place for you to introduce your ideas and answer the question in broad terms. This means that you don’t need to go into too much detail, as you’ll be doing that in the main body of the essay. That means you don’t need quotes, and you’re unlikely to need to quote anything from the poem yet. One thing to remember is that you should mention both the poet’s name and the poem’s title in your introduction. This might seem unnecessary, but it is a good habit to get into, especially if you are writing an essay in which other questions/poems are available to choose from.

As we mentioned earlier, you are unlikely to get a question that simply asks you to analyze a poem in its entirety, with no specific angle. More likely, you’ll be asked to write an essay about a particular thematic element of the poem. Your introduction should reflect this. However, many students fall into the trap of simply regurgitating the question without offering anything more. For example, a question might ask you to explore a poet’s presentation of love, memory, loss, or conflict . You should avoid the temptation to simply hand these terms back in your introduction without expanding upon them. You will get a chance to see this in action below.

Let’s say we were given the following question:

Explore Patrick Kavanagh’s presentation of loss and memory in Memory of My Father

Taking on board the earlier advice, you should hopefully produce an introduction similar to the one written below.

Patrick Kavanagh presents loss as an inescapable fact of existence and subverts the readers’ expectations of memory by implying that memories can cause immense pain, even if they feature loved ones. This essay will argue that Memory of My Father depicts loss to be cyclical and thus emphasizes the difficulties that inevitably occur in the early stages of grief.

As you can see, the introduction is fairly condensed and does not attempt to analyze any specific poetic elements. There will be plenty of time for that as the essay progresses. Similarly, the introduction does not simply repeat the words ‘loss’ and ‘memory’ from the question but expands upon them and offers a glimpse of the kind of interpretation that will follow without providing too much unnecessary detail at this early stage.

Main Paragraphs

Now, we come to the main body of the essay, the quality of which will ultimately determine the strength of our essay. This section should comprise of 4-5 paragraphs, and each of these should analyze an aspect of the poem and then link the effect that aspect creates to the poem’s themes or message. They can also draw upon context when relevant if that is a required component of your particular essay.

There are a few things to consider when writing analytical paragraphs and many different templates for doing so, some of which are listed below.

• PEE (Point-Evidence-Explain)
• PEA (Point-Evidence-Analysis)
• PETAL (Point-Evidence-Technique-Analysis-Link)
• IQA (Identify-Quote-Analyze)
• PEEL (Point-Evidence-Explain-Link)

Some of these may be familiar to you, and they all have their merits. As you can see, there are all effective variations of the same thing. Some might use different terms or change the order, but it is possible to write great paragraphs using all of them.

One of the most important aspects of writing these kind of paragraphs is selecting the features you will be identifying and analyzing. A full list of poetic features with explanations can be found here. If you have done your plan correctly, you should have already identified a series of poetic devices and begun to think about how they link to the poem’s themes.

It is important to remember that, when analyzing poetry, everything is fair game! You can analyze the language, structure, shape, and punctuation of the poem. Try not to rely too heavily on any single type of paragraph. For instance, if you have written three paragraphs about linguistic features ( similes , hyperbole , alliteration , etc), then try to write your next one about a structural device ( rhyme scheme , enjambment , meter , etc).

Regardless of what structure you are using, you should remember that multiple interpretations are not only acceptable but actively encouraged. Techniques can create effects that link to the poem’s message or themes in both complementary and entirely contrasting ways. All these possibilities should find their way into your essay. You are not writing a legal argument that must be utterly watertight – you are interpreting a subjective piece of art.

It is important to provide evidence for your points in the form of either a direct quotation or, when appropriate, a reference to specific lines or stanzas . For instance, if you are analyzing a strict rhyme scheme, you do not need to quote every rhyming word. Instead, you can simply name the rhyme scheme as, for example, AABB , and then specify whether or not this rhyme scheme is applied consistently throughout the poem or not. When you are quoting a section from the poem, you should endeavor to embed your quotation within your line so that your paragraph flows and can be read without cause for confusion.

When it comes to context, remember to check whether or not your essay question requires it before you begin writing. If you do need to use it, you must remember that it is used to elevate your analysis of the poem, not replace it. Think of context like condiments or spices. When used appropriately, they can enhance the experience of eating a meal, but you would have every right to complain if a restaurant served you a bowl of ketchup in lieu of an actual meal. Moreover, you should remember to only use the contextual information that helps your interpretation rather than simply writing down facts to prove you have memorized them. Examiners will not be impressed that you know the date a particular poet was born or died unless that information relates to the poem itself.

For the sake of ease, let’s return to our earlier question:

Have a look at the example paragraph below, taking note of the ways in which it interprets the linguistic technique in several different ways.

Kavanagh uses a metaphor when describing how the narrator ’s father had “fallen in love with death” in order to capture the narrator’s conflicted attitudes towards his loss. By conflating the ordinarily juxtaposed states of love and death, Kavanagh implies the narrator’s loss has shattered his previously held understanding of the world and left him confused. Similarly, the metaphor could suggest the narrator feels a degree of jealousy, possibly even self-loathing, because their father embraced death willingly rather than remaining with the living. Ultimately, the metaphor’s innate impossibility speaks to the narrator’s desire to rationalize their loss because the reality, that his father simply died, is too painful for him to bear.

As you can see, the paragraph clearly engages with a poetic device and uses an appropriately embedded quotation. The subsequent interpretations are then varied enough to avoid repeating each other, but all clearly link to the theme of loss that was mentioned in the question. Obviously, this is only one analytical paragraph, but a completed essay should contain 4-5. This would allow the writer to analyze enough different devices and link them to both themes mentioned in the question.

Conclusions

By this stage, you should have written the bulk of your essay in the form of your introduction and 4-5 main analytical paragraphs. If you have done those things properly, then the conclusion should largely take care of itself.

The world’s simplest essay plan sounds something like this:

• Tell them what you’re going to tell them
• Tell them what you’ve told them

This is, naturally, an oversimplification, but it is worth bearing in mind. The conclusion to an essay is not the place to introduce your final, groundbreaking interpretation. Nor is it the place to reveal a hitherto unknown piece of contextual information that shatters any prior critical consensus with regard to the poem you are writing about. If you do either of these things, the examiner will be asking themselves one simple question: why didn’t they write this earlier?

In its most simple form, a conclusion is there, to sum up the points you have made and nothing more.

As with the previous sections, there is a little more to a great conclusion than merely stating the things you have already made. The trick to a great conclusion is to bind those points together to emphasize the essay’s overarching thread or central argument. This is a subtle skill, but mastering it will really help you to finish your essays with a flourish by making your points feel like they are more than the sum of their parts.

Finally, let’s remind ourselves of the hypothetical essay question we’ve been using:

Remember that, just like your introduction, your conclusion should be brief and direct and must not attempt to do more than it needs to.

In conclusion, Kavanagh’s poem utilizes numerous techniques to capture the ways in which loss is both inescapable and a source of enormous pain. Moreover, the poet subverts positive memories by showcasing how they can cause loved ones more pain than comfort in the early stages of grief. Ultimately, the poem demonstrates how malleable memory can be in the face of immense loss due to the way the latter shapes and informs the former.

As you can see, this conclusion is confident and authoritative but does not need to provide evidence to justify this tone because that evidence has already been provided earlier in the essay. You should pay close attention to the manner in which the conclusion links different points together under one banner in order to provide a sense of assuredness.

You should refer to the poet by either using their full name or, more commonly, their surname. After your first usage, you may refer to them as ‘the poet.’ Never refer to the poet using just their first name.

This is a good question, and the answer entirely depends on the level of study as well as the nature of the examination. If you are writing a timed essay for a school exam, you are unlikely to need any form of referencing. If, however, you are writing an essay as part of coursework or at a higher education institution, you may need to refer to the specific guidelines of that institution.

Again, this will depend on the type of essay you are being asked to write. If you are writing a longer essay or writing at a higher educational level, it can be useful to refer to other poems in the writer’s repertoire to help make comments on an aspect of the poem you are primarily writing about. However, for the kind of essay outlined in this article, you should focus solely on the poem you have been asked to write about.

This is one of the most common concerns students have about writing essays . Ultimately, the quality of an essay is more likely to be determined by the quality of paragraphs than the quantity anyway, so you should focus on making your paragraphs as good as they can be. Beyond this, it is important to remember that the time required to write a paragraph is not fixed. The more you write, the faster they will become. You should trust the process, focus on making each paragraph as good as it can be, and you’ll be amazed at how the timing issue takes care of itself.

Other Resources

We hope you have found this article useful and would love for you to comment or reach out to us if you have any queries about what we’ve written. We’d love to hear your feedback!

In the meantime, we’ve collated a list of resources you might find helpful when setting out to tackle a poetry essay, which you can find below.

• Do poems have to rhyme?
• 10 important elements of poetry
• How to analyze a poem with SMILE
• How to approach unseen poetry
• 18 Different Types of Themes in Poetry

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When to Punctuate Titles in Italics or Quotes

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You may have wondered in the middle of typing up a research project : Do I italicize  a song title? What about a painting?​ Even the most experienced writers have a problem remembering the proper punctuation for certain types of titles. Books are italicized (or underlined) and articles are put in quotation marks. That's about as far as many people can remember.​

Many teachers require students to use Modern Language Association style for research papers and essays covering language arts, cultural studies, and the humanities . There is a trick to remembering how to treat titles in MLA style, and it works well enough that you can commit most types of titles to memory. It's the big and little trick.

Big Things vs. Little Things

Big things and things that can stand on their own, like books, are italicized. Little things that are dependent or that come as part of a group, like chapters, are put into quotation marks. Think of a CD or an album as a major (big) work that can be divided into smaller parts, or songs. The individual song names (small part) are punctuated with quotation marks .

For example:

• The Sweet Escape , by Gwen Stefani, includes the song "Wind It Up."

While this is not a perfect rule, it can be helpful for determining whether to italicize or surround an item in quotation marks when you have no resources at hand.

Furthermore, italicize or underline any published collection, like a book of poetry. Put the individual entry, like a poem, in quotation marks. However: a long, epic poem that is often published on its own would be treated like a book. The Odyssey is one example.

Punctuating Titles of Works of Art

Creating a work of art is an enormous task. For that reason, you can think of art as a big accomplishment. That might sound a bit corny, but it will help you remember. Individual works of art, like paintings and sculptures, are underlined or italicized:

• Michelangelo 's David
• The Last Supper

Note that a photograph—although not any less significant or important—is often much smaller than a work of created art, and is placed in quotation marks. Following are guidelines for punctuating titles according to MLA standards.

Titles and Names to Italicize

Works to put in italics include:

• A sculpture or statue
• A TV Series
• A cartoon series
• An encyclopedia
• A newspaper

Titles to Put Into Quotation Marks

When deciding how to handle smaller works, put quotation marks around:

• A short story
• A commercial
• An individual episode in a TV series (like "The Soup Nazi" on Seinfeld)
• A cartoon episode, like "Trouble With Dogs"
• A newspaper story

More Tips on Punctuating Titles

Some titles are merely capitalized and not given additional punctuation. These include:

• Religious works, like the Bible or the Koran
• MLA Format Example (With Sample Pages)
• Organize Your Homework With Color Coded Supplies
• How to Determine a Reliable Source on the Internet
• Learning Styles: Holistic or Global Learning
• When to Use Whom vs. Who
• When and How to Write Roman Numerals
• What Is the Plural of Genus?
• What Does Critical Reading Really Mean?
• Choosing a Strong Research Topic
• 8 Ways to Increase Your Attention Span
• Top 10 Healthy Homework Habits
• How to Understand a Difficult Reading Passage
• Cheating Is More Serious in College Than in High School
• How Does Personality Affect Study Habits?
• Setting Goals to Succeed at School
• Make the Most of Your Tactile Learning Style

Passing Through

Poetry blog.

How to Write Poem Titles: The Ultimate Guide

Do you find yourself stuck when it comes to titling your poems? You're not alone. It can be challenging to come up with the perfect title that accurately represents your poem and grabs your reader's interest. In this post, I will go over everything you need to know to write a poem title that does both things.

Why Is Coming Up With a Poem's Title So Difficult?

If you're like me, you write your poem first and say: voila, poem written ! And then you go, oh yeah, the title. Title, title, tile...

Writing a title for your poem can be difficult. Writing the title seems more like a chore than part of the joy of writing your poem. The title can seem to exist outside the world of your poem, so it's easy to get bogged down thinking about what on earth it should be.

But I'd encourage you to not think of the title as existing outside of your poem—the title is just as much a part of the poem as the body . If you can reframe your thinking to consider the title as part of the poem's universe, it can become easier to write.

Let's take a look at what a great poem title achieves by studying some on-point poem titles.

In the examples below, the titles of the poems will appear in bold text.

What Does a Great Title for a Poem Accomplish?

Sometimes, it seems like the title is an afterthought or an advertisement to get people to read the poem. But this isn't so.

A good title is just as much a part of the poem as the poem itself.

A good poem title can accomplish many things:

Make us curious about the poem

Lead us into the poem

Provide orientation (place, time)

Make us think twice

Provide context (what is this really about?)

#1 A Great Title Leads Us Into the Poem

One method of writing a good poem title is to use the title to serve as the first line of the poem. To use this method, the entire title should both serve as the first line of the poem and give an overall idea o f what the poem is about.

Take the below example by poet Barbara Crooker. An excerpt of the poem appears below.

And Now It’s September,

and the garden diminishes: cucumber leaves rumpled

and rusty, zucchini felled by borers, tomatoes sparse

on the vines. But out in the perennial beds, there’s one last

blast of color: ignitions of goldenrod, flamboyant

asters, spiraling mums, all those flashy spikes waving

in the wind, conducting summer’s final notes.

As you can see, the title of the poem also serves as the first line of the poem. It even has a comma at the end of the line to emphasize that fact! But it also makes an excellent title because it encapsulates what the poem is about.

It lets the reader know this poem will be about the beginning of September, the beginning of fall, and the changing of the seasons. It's genius in its simplicity!

#2 A Great Poem Title Provides Orientation

Another method for writing a poem title is to come up with a title that lets us know where we are in time and space. Take the example below.

"Awakening in New York" was published in 1983 in the great poet Maya Angelou's collection Shaker, Why Don't You Sing . This a short poem, so the entire text is shown below.

Let's see how Ms. Angelou uses the poem title to bring context to her writing.

Awaking in New York

Curtains forcing their will

against the wind,

children sleep,

exchanging dreams with

seraphim. The city

drags itself awake on

subway straps; and

I, an alarm, awake as a

rumor of war,

lie stretching into dawn,

unasked and unheeded.

Here, the title serves as a reference point— it lets the reader know where we are and what this poem is about . The title is simple, but the words are poetic and tell a story.

If we were to read the poem without reading the title, we may enjoy it, but we may be left a little curious as to where we are and what's happening.

The title "Awakening in New York" informs us that this is about someone waking up in New York and the city itself awakening. Also, the word "awakening" has multiple meanings. It can mean to literally "wake up" but it can also mean to realize something , or it can mean a change is occurring .

"Awakening in New York" gives us many roads to travel as we consider the poem's meaning.

#3 Great Poem Titles Makes Us Think Twice About a Poem

A writer can use the title to give a whole different context to the poem that wouldn't exist without the title. These are some of my favorite types of titles. They are akin to a plot twist.

Read the short poem below by Langston Hughes.

Cool face of the river

Asked me for a kiss.

What are your impressions? To me, it sounds like a serene moment. It personifies the river, having it ask the writer for a kiss.

What a sweet love song to nature, don't you think? Well, maybe things aren't always as they seem...let's look at it again with the title.

Suicide's Note

Okay, now we are thinking twice about that sweet ode to the river! The author's title turns this individual story from a few lines about a river into a haunting story about the contemplation of suicide.

What I find interesting about this poem and its title is that the writer never takes responsibility for the suicidal thoughts. The river asks him to dive in head first, he's not thinking about it. The note belongs to suicide, not to the writer.

By personifying these elements, the poet achieves a certain distance from a terrible thought.

#4 A Great Poem Title Makes the Reader Curious

If you want to grab a reader's attention and make them read your poem, your title should pique curiosity and get people wanting to find out more.

Take the poem title "Small Poems for Big" by Chinaka Hodge.

Small Poems for Big? What is that all about? Who is Big? How small are these poems? How many are there?

See how this title gets us asking questions?

Now let's look at an excerpt.

Small Poems for Big

BY CHINAKA HODGE

Twenty-four haiku, for each year he lived

when you die, i’m told

they only use given names

christopher wallace

no notorious

neither b.i.g. nor smalls

just voletta’s son

Okay! From the first two stanzas, the reader sees that the "Big" referred to in the title is none other than the Notorious B.I.G., Biggy Smalls, aka the late rapper, Christopher Wallace.

Again, another simple title that accomplishes so much . I love it.

What About Great Poems That Have Simple Poem Titles?

Now that we've discussed what a great poem title might do and looked at some examples, let's talk about the elephant in the room.

That is, there are thousands of amazing poems by some of the greatest poets in all of literature that have very simple titles . The title is often either a repetition of a phrase or word that appears in the poem (for example Audre Lorde's "Afterimages") or, the title just labels the form of the poem (for example, William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 2").

If you're reading this post, likely, you have not yet become a master poet. I certainly haven't. So, until you are a master poet, all your poems should begin with creative titles that can stand on their own and draw attention.

Until you are a master poet, all your poems should begin with creative titles that can stand on their own and draw attention.

My Process for Writing Poem Titles

I'd like to share the process of coming up with poem titles for my chapbook White Noise Crucible ( published in 2022 by Bottlecap Press).

Most of the poems in my chapbook were originally shared on my Instagram without titles. When I was compiling them as a chapbook, I at first decided to leave them without titles. Let them speak for themselves , I thought.

When it was time to submit my final manuscript to the publisher, that is when I decided they should have titles, if only for a table of contents!

Below is the first poem in the chapbook, now titled "passing through." I would label this title under the makes us think twice category of titles. Let's read the poem first.

passing through

photons penetrate

fill me with light

everything blooms

The title phrase, "passing through", has a couple of meanings in this poem. It can refer to the "photons penetrate" line, which is about light particles passing through our bodies. Or it can refer to the ephemeral nature of life and how we are just visitors passing through it.

In that sense, I wanted to get people to think twice about the poem. Let's look at one more.

This next poem title is an example of providing additional context to the poem. The poem's title is "it's a reference to DNA." The title is meant to spell things out and help the reader understand the poem better, as it contains scientific references not everyone may immediately get.

it’s a reference to DNA

magic had me dazzled

in a fated well

blackness boomeranged into me

no drag on the fletching of time’s arrow

to understand

what i had yet to learn

it is this:

eons are enemies

a crucible of time, mutation, selection,

meiosis, mitosis—

a G where a C should have settled

an A where a T should have been

Without the title of the poem below, I realized many people would not understand what this poem is about unless they can remember back to high school biology. The letters in the last stanza G, A, C,  and T  refer to the nucleotides that comprise DNA. The fact that they are mixed up in the poem means something has gone wrong and a mutation has occurred.

Side note: A reader once asked me if I worked in the medical field. They noted that my poetry contained a lot of scientific language. I hadn't considered this before and thought it was an interesting observation. I do not work in the medical field, but I did major in psychology and find our biological nature to be very poetic. So that's perhaps where my use of scientific language in poetry comes from.

How to Write a Poem Title

If you're trying to write a good poem title and are having trouble, don't get discouraged. You just need to put some thought and care into it. I recommend looking at examples of poems from your favorite poets to gain inspiration if you are feeling stuck.

Remember the best titles for poems :

Exercise: Brainstorm 3-5 titles for your poem. It's good to see where your creativity can lead you. Then choose the best one!

Try using different methods from the list above. Avoid simply repeating a word or phrase that occurs in your poem. Make the title a part of your poem just as much as the rest. And make sure it's going to grab the reader's attention so that they'll move beyond the title and continue reading.

Best of luck in writing your titles. If you want to chat more about writing poem titles, DM me on Instagram @elysehartpoetry .

If you found this post useful, subscribe to the Passing Through poetry blog using the form below to never miss a post. To support my poetry, please consider buying a book from my shop.

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When you mention a poem in your paper, do you italicize or underline the name of the poem?

To mention a poem in the body of the paper:

• Italicize the title of the poem
• Capitalize the first letter of words four letters or longer in the poem's title.  

Visit the APA Help guide for other citation questions.

Thank you for using ASK US. For further assistance, please contact your Baker librarians .

• Last Updated Mar 03, 2021
• Answered By Patrick Mullane

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MLA Style Guide, 7th Edition: Titles

• About In-text Citations
• In-text Examples
• How to Paraphrase and Quote
• What to Include
• Editors, Translators, etc.
• Publication Date
• Volume/Issue
• Place of Publication
• Date of Access (when needed)
• Book with Personal Author(s)
• Book with Editor(s)
• Book with Organization as Author
• Work with No Author
• Parts of Books or Anthologies
• Multi-Volume Works
• Journal Article
• Newspaper Article
• Magazine Article
• Government Publication
• Web Publications
• Other Common Sources
• Formatting Your Paper
• Formatting Your 'Works Cited' List
• Annotated Bibliography

General Rules for Titles in Works Cited List (in progress)

In general, the title of a work is taken from the title page of the publication. Refer to section 3.6.4 of the MLA Manual for more about titles and quotations within titles. Section 3.6.5 discusses exceptions to the rules.

• Rules for capitalizing are strict. Capitalize all principal words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc.). Do not capitalize articles, prepostions, or conjunctions when they fall in the middle of a title.
• Separate a subtitle with a colon and a space.
• Italicize titles of larger works like books, periodicals, databases, and Web sites.
• Use quotation marks for titles published in larger works like articles, essays, chapters, poems, Web pages, songs, and speeches.

Book titles

Book titles are italicized.

• Writing Matters: A Handbook for Writing and Research (book)
• Their Eyes Were Watching God
• All the Pretty Horses

Chapter title in a book or anthology

The book title is  italicized ; the title of the article or essay is enclosed in quotations.

Henderson, Carol E. "Refiguring the Flesh: The Word, the Body, and the Rituals of Being Loved in Beloved and Go Tell It on the Mountain ." Critical Insights: Toni Morrison . Ed. Solomon O. Iyasere and Marla W. Iyasere. Pasadena: Salem P, 2010. Print.

Beloved and Go Tell It on the Mountain (book titles) remain italicized in the article title.

Journals and Magazines

The title of the periodical (journal, magazine, or newspaper) is italicized. The title of the article or work is enclosed in quotations.

Danport, Sandra. " A Study of Malawian Households." Journal of Developing Areas ...

Gardiner, Andy. "Stanford Could Lose QB, Coach." USA Today ...

The title of the periodical (journal, magazine, or newspaper) is italicized. The title of the article or work is enclosed in quotations. Omit any introductory article in the newspaper title for English-language newspapers ( Palm Beach Post, not The Palm Beach Post ). Retain the article in non-English language newspapers ( Le monde ).

The title of the work is italicized if the work is independent. The title of the work is enclosed in quotation marks if it is part of a larger work. The title of the overall Web site is italicized if distinct from the the title of the work.

Park, Madison. "How Does a Baby Get To Be Obese." CNN.com ....

Salda, Michael N., ed. The Cinderella Project ...

• << Previous: Publication Date
• Next: Editions >>
• Last Updated: Dec 11, 2020 4:39 PM
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Marking Titles

A reader asks:

When writing about a short story, do you underline the title of the story or do you use quotation marks around the title of the story?

Quotation Marks:

The most common way to mark a short story title is to enclose it in quotation marks. Titles of newspaper and magazine articles are also enclosed in quotation marks. Here are a few examples:

• “Bartleby the Scrivener” by Herman Melville
• “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor
• “ Mommy Madness ” by Judith Warner in Newsweek

Italics or Underlining:

Longer works—novels, magazines, newspapers, movies—are typically underlined or set in italic type. Although either is acceptable, I prefer italics, especially on the web, since an underlined word can be mistaken for a hyperlink.

• Moby Dick by Herman Melville
• The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• The Simpsons
• The New York Times

Extra Credit:

I’m not sure why, but The New Yorker puts quotation marks around everything, whether it’s a short story or a novel or a television show. I suppose the most important thing is internal consistency. If you use italics for one novel’s title, use italics for every novel’s title; don’t switch to quotation marks or underlining halfway through an article, or even in a different article of the same publication.

Any questions? Post them in the comment form, and I’ll answer them as promptly as I can.

45 Responses to Marking Titles

When writing about a television show, should you underline the title?

Jill, As I dig deeper into this issue, I’m finding that the conventions vary depending on where your work is being published. For many American students and writers of scholarly works in the humanities, the MLA Handbook and MLA Style Manual are the authoritative guides. Their advice is to underline (or italicize) the title of a television show, but to put a show’s episode title in quotation marks. For newspaper and magazine publishing, the Associated Press Stylebook has gained widespread acceptance, though individual publishers often have their own complementary guides. Here’s what the AP Stylebook says:

Apply the guidelines listed here to book titles, computer game titles (but not software titles), movie titles, opera titles, play titles, poem titles, song titles, television program titles , and the titles of lectures, speeches, and works of art. —Put quotation marks around the names of all such works except the Bible and books that are primarily catalogs of reference material.

do you underline a song or put it in quotations?

Do I underline the title of a play in my essay? or italics, or quotation?

Ali, put song titles inside quotation marks. Sarah, the rule that I learned long ago (and which you probably should double-check) is that one-act and other short plays take quotation marks, but longer plays take italics or underlining. This “rule” is consistent with the distinction between short stories (quotation marks) and novels (italics or underlining).

Do you underline a movie title or use quotation mark aroun them? I read that we use quotation mark around short poems. What do you mean by “short”? How long do you consider “short” ?

Do you underline the title of movies or put them in quotation marks?

What is the difference between computer games and software? Aren’t computer games considered software and if so, do they have to be underlined?

Van Anh and mrc, I’m not able to give you a definitive answer to your questions. As you should have read in the entry and in my comment (#2) , style guides vary in their rules for formatting titles. Your best bet is to consult the generally accepted style manual for the discipline or field in which you are writing.

What about essays? Do they fall into the same category as short stories and articles?

Hey, what should I use when sourcing a poem? Quotation marks?

Sure, quotation marks will work, unless you’re citing an epic poem, in which case italics or underlining would be preferable.

What about the title of an art show?

do you underline the names of editors or publishing companies?

I understand quotes are used for a short story, but what about a collection of short stories?

You can treat a collection of short stories the same way you would treat a novel: Italicize or underline the title.

Do you use italics, quotes or underlining when refering to board games in a newsletter? Specifically: Chess, Snakes and Ladders, Pick Up Sticks, Go Fish. Thank you.

Hi Karen, The answer is none of the above. All you need to do is capitalize the words.

Do you underline the specific name of a store? ex. Johnson’s Grocery or Roses and Ribbons?

No. Just capitalize it.

How about TV shows? Underline or quotation marks? ex. The Tonight Show

okay so im writing an essay over poems by walt whitman. would i use quotations or underline the name of one of his short poems in his book leaves of grass?

Hello, I ran into your site doing a research on conclusions. I found some of your comments and questions useful. What role do conclusions play in writing? Is there a general rule? Is it an over summary of the story? And is there a wrong way to write them? Anything will be a helpful start.Hope to hear back soon. Thank you.

Should you underline the title of a Newsletter when citing it on a webpage or place it in italics?

Does the newsletter contain more than one article? If so, treat it the same way you would treat a newspaper: underline or italicize it.

Reading the questions and answers has been relly helpful. Thanks!

How do you decide whether to capitalize small words like “it “and “is” or “the” in the title of a book etc?

In my essay I am unsure if i should use quotation marks or underline the name of a short story

Kattie: you should use quotation marks.

What about a band name? Do you use quotations? I’m writing a story for my class and the sentence is: As I adjusted my Spice Girls backpack and picked up my Rugrats lunchbox I tried to hold back the tears. Thanks!

Do you underline awards, like Newberry ones, or quote them?

Hi. If writing out the title of a chapter in a book do you put it in quotation marks, italicize, or just capitalize?

What do I do for the title of an artwork within a quote or block quote? Do I use single quote marks as if it were a quoatation? Or stick with the double?

In a novel is it correct to use italics for foreign language words? Please reply as soon as possible. Thanks, Miriam Sobel

do you underline, italicize, or put the name of an essay in quotes??? i want to put this essay in my very important language arts report, which is like 90% of my grade for this semester….

please answer me….thx!

Hi Emma, Put the title of an essay in quotation marks.

This site was very helpful to me..my question was should I underline a story title in an essay?

Nichole, The very first sentence in the entry above states, “The most common way to mark a short story title is to enclose it in quotation marks.” Don’t underline a story; wrap it in quotation marks.

This page has been extremely helpful. Thank you so much!

Do you put a band name in quotes or italics or do you just leave it alone?

Hi Shelby, I would just leave it alone.

Do I underline, italicize, or put quotes around the title of a legislative bill? Thanks!

As Diana asked years before me, what sort of marking style would you use for the titles of software or video games? Thanks in advance. PS: Also, why do you not answer all questions? I realize that you get many of these questions, but I have seen some questions go unanswered (at least, as far as visibility to the public goes) whereas other questions are publicly answered numerous times! This is redundant and, I feel, terribly ineffective. I appreciate the website very much, as well as the effort you put into replying to its visitors. I just wish I didn’t have to re-ask a question that’s already been asked just because it was ignored.

JaredMT, Style guides offer contradictory information about such matters, so it’s impossible for me to tell you what is correct in every context. You’ll have to refer to an appropriate style guide for the type of writing you’re doing. I don’t answer all questions because I don’t have the time to do so. I have responsibilities as an employee, freelance consultant, father, and husband that more important than (to me) than answering questions here. Also, I changed careers about five years ago from English instruction to web development. I try to answer questions about grammar punctuation, and style as I find time, but sometimes it’s hard to put myself back in that “world.” I’m sorry that questions go unanswered. Maybe I should turn off the comment-writing feature. Thanks for provoking me to think about this.

Do you underline the title of an essay?

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Home > Blog > Tips for Online Students > Tips for Students > Knowing When To Underline Or Italicize: Your Go-To Guide

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Knowing When To Underline Or Italicize: Your Go-To Guide

Updated: June 19, 2024

Published: May 27, 2021

Knowing when to underline or italicize can be confusing. But it doesn’t have to be! In this article, we’ll lay out all the basics, plus a few common difficulties that confuse many writers, so you’ll be an expert in no time.

At the end of the article, you’ll get the chance to practice your hand at some sample sentences, so you’ll be sure that you know the ins and outs of using italics and underlines.

Italics Vs Underline: Clarifying The Confusion

In the past (before computers and MLA handbooks), italics and underlines were used to emphasize certain words or titles within the text. It let the reader know what was important, or what was separate from the rest of the sentence. They were both used interchangeably, as long as they were consistent.

Now, with the ability to change formatting with the click of a button, italics are generally used to indicate titles, and only sometimes for emphasis. Meanwhile, underlining is mostly reserved to replace italics in handwritten papers. Manuals and guidebooks, such as the MLA handbook, are now widely used in large institutions or according to the country’s standards, so that specific writing conventions, grammar rules, and formatting styles have become uniform.

With that said, the general rule is that italics are used for titles of books, movies, TV and radio shows, magazines, works of art, and long poems. As mentioned before, underlining is a substitute for italics when writing titles by hand.

Proper formatting in an essay can be confusing for many students: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-blue-blazer-holding-white-paper-3727468/

Titles of long works.

Titles that should be italicized are longer works. These include titles of books, movies, TV and radio shows, journals and magazines, and long poems. In the next section, we’ll see how these works differ from titles of shorter works which are put in quotations instead.

• The novel Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte, was published in 1847 under the pen name of Currer Bell.
• The movie Home Alone , released in 1990, made a worldwide total of $476,684,675 in box office revenue.

Titles Of Smaller Works

The titles of smaller works are put in “quotations” in order to differentiate them from longer works. These smaller works include titles of chapters, short stories, TV or radio show episodes, articles, and short poems.

In the examples below, note how you can recognize the difference between the shorter works and larger works just by seeing how they are emphasized in the sentence. This makes it impossible to confuse the title of a chapter with the book that it belongs to, or the episode from its TV show.

• The chapter entitled “The Castaway” in Moby Dick describes the near-death experience of a character named Pip.
• Edgar Allen Poe’s short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher,” was originally published in a Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine.
• The pilot episode of Friends , which was released on September 22, 1994, is called “The One Where Monica Gets A Roommate.”

Punctuation In Titles: Common Confusions

Question marks.

Confusion can come up when a title includes a question mark or an exclamation mark in the title itself. For example, the book Who Has Seen the Wind? includes a question mark in it.

The way to deal with these titles is to italicize the question mark as well, just as it is above. By doing so, you can differentiate this title from an actual question, such as writing: Have you read Gone With the Wind ?

The same idea applies to exclamation marks — for example, the movie Mamma Mia! , which includes an exclamation mark in the title. Note the italicization, and the difference between writing Mamma Mia! , the movie, and writing: I can’t believe that you never watched The Parent Trap !

Commas and periods

The confusion of commas and periods when it comes to quotations is a debate between different handbooks and countries. According to the MLA (Modern Language Association) handbook, commas and periods are placed inside of quotation marks.

• “The Seinfeld Chronicles , ” the first episode of Seinfeld , had 15.4 million viewers in America.
• Among the short stories of James Joyce included in the collection Dubliners are “Araby , ” “The Sisters , ” and “The Encounter.”

Solidify your new skills by completing practice sentences: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-wearing-black-and-white-stripe-shirt-looking-at-white-printer-papers-on-the-wall-212286/

Let’s practice.

Try your hand at your new skills! Below are five sentences without any italics or quotations. Italicize the longer works and put the shorter works in quotations. If you get stuck, check back in the article, and you’ll be an expert in no time. Be sure to pay attention to tricky commas, periods, and question marks.

• The Lazy Controller, chapter two of Thinking Fast and Slow, talks about multitasking and its effect on thinking.
• The Yellow Wallpaper, a short story by Catherine Perkins Gilman, was originally published in The New England Magazine in January 1892.
• John Lennon’s album Imagine included favorites such as Gimme Some Truth, How Do You Sleep?, and, of course, Imagine.
• The premiere episode of Family Matters is called The Mama Who Came To Dinner, and relays the drama of Carl’s mother coming to live with him.
• The short story Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway was first published in a magazine called Transition, and was only later published in his book Men Without Women.

Why Is Proper Indentation Important?

College essays  .

No matter what you study in college, most students write a lot of essays during their school years. While some degrees may put more of an emphasis on writing proper essays , most teachers and professors will expect a certain level of basic grammar and formatting knowledge. Before you even step foot into college, you’ll most likely be expected to write an application essay . It’s important to put your best foot forward, and small formatting rules can go a long way in making a good first impression.

Landing your dream job  

In addition to college essays, prospective employers and job positions will require and look for basic (or advanced, depending on the position) writing skills. Whether you think your dream job requires writing skills or not, writing is a part of everyday life and work, from emails and text messages, to presentations and reports. Having good writing skills will help you make a good first impression, land your dream job, and do your best work.

Proper writing is an important skill for any job: https://www.pexels.com/photo/writing-notes-idea-class-7103/

Having a successful career.

Though different students earn a degree for different reasons, many are hoping to work toward a successful career. In order to do this, the right preparation is key. Preparation may be earning a degree, gaining specific skills, or having the right guidance along the way.

University of the People prepares our students for successful careers by providing program advising , mentorship , and an emphasis on career development . We know that these extra details, much like formatting in an essay, make a big difference for the future success of our students. University of the People is a tuition-free online university that offers degree programs in business administration, computer science, health science, and education.

Wrapping Up

Now you know when to underline or italicize, and much more. To wrap up, italics should be used for the titles of longer works such as movies, books, and TV shows, and underlining for handwritten papers.

In addition, we hope you’ve learned the more tricky rules such as question marks and commas, and that you’ve given some thought to the importance of writing for your future education and success.

In this article

At UoPeople, our blog writers are thinkers, researchers, and experts dedicated to curating articles relevant to our mission: making higher education accessible to everyone. Read More

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• Writing Poetry

How to Write Poem Titles

Last Updated: September 7, 2024 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Alicia Cook . Alicia Cook is a Professional Writer based in Newark, New Jersey. With over 12 years of experience, Alicia specializes in poetry and uses her platform to advocate for families affected by addiction and to fight for breaking the stigma against addiction and mental illness. She holds a BA in English and Journalism from Georgian Court University and an MBA from Saint Peter’s University. Alicia is a bestselling poet with Andrews McMeel Publishing and her work has been featured in numerous media outlets including the NY Post, CNN, USA Today, the HuffPost, the LA Times, American Songwriter Magazine, and Bustle. She was named by Teen Vogue as one of the 10 social media poets to know and her poetry mixtape, “Stuff I’ve Been Feeling Lately” was a finalist in the 2016 Goodreads Choice Awards. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 96,646 times.

You've written a poem , congratulations! Now, you just need to think of a good title that will pique the reader’s interest and set them up for what to expect. Using keywords and details from your poem can help you craft a strong title. You can also refer to the poem’s tone and context to come up with a title that will engage readers. Once you create a title, format it properly to polish off your poem.

Using Keywords and Details in the Poem

• For example, you may choose keywords like “good” and “sister,” creating a title like “The Good Sister” or “Be good, Sister.”

• For example, you may use a synonym for “good” to create a title like, “The Excellent Sister” or “My Precious Sister.”

• For example, if your poem focuses on a girl named Eva and her pet swan, you may use a title like “Eva and the Swan.” If your poem is about a Denny’s in your hometown of Sturgis, you may use a title like “Denny’s in Sturgis” or “Denny’s, Sturgis.”

• For example, you may choose a verb like “beating” and create a title like, “Beating” or “I Beat.” Or you may pick adjectives like “blue,” “dying,” and “stunning” to create a title like, “Dying Blue” or “Stunning Blue.”

• For example, you may take a repeating line like “she jumped high in track and field” to create a title like “High in Track and Field” or “She Jumped.”

• Avoid picking an image that might give away the crux or turn in the poem. The image should provide some context for the reader but not give any revelations in the poem away.
• For example, you may use an image of a woman leaping over a hurdle on the field, red dirt flying in her wake in the poem, and create a title like, “Red Dirt Flys” or “Woman Leaps.”

• For example, if you have a last line like, “She ran off the field, in victory,” you may create a title like, “In Victory.”

Referring to the Poem’s Tone and Context

• For example, if the poem is a playful tale about a little girl named Eva and her pet swan, you may use a title like, “Eva’s Pet Swan” or “Eva’s Friend, a Swan.”
• If the poem is a dark tale about Eva’s difficult relationship with her pet swan, you may use a title like, “The Problem of the Swan” or simply, “Eva and the Swan.”

• For example, you may use a title like, “Monday at the Corner Cafe” or “4:44.”

• For example, if you used a newspaper photo, you may refer to the subject in the photo in the title of the poem. Or if you referred to a recent family dinner you went to to create the poem, you may use a title like, “Sunday Dinner” or “At the Dinner Table.”

• For example, if you wrote a sonnet about your dog, you may use a title like “Sonnet About My Dog.” Or if you wrote a sestina about your best friend, you may use a title like, “Best Friend: Sestina.”

Formatting the Title

• For example, rather than use a title like, “The Time I Had a Good Dinner on Sundays,” you may cut it down to, “Good Sunday Dinner,” or “The Good Dinner on Sundays.”
• In some cases, a longer title may be appropriate if you feel it strongly encapsulates the poem or has a good ring to it.

• For example, you would format a title as: “The Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock” or “At the Dinner Table.”

• You may also want to change the title if someone else has already used it so your poem can stand out on its own and not be considered for someone else’s work.

Expert Q&A

You Might Also Like

• ↑ Alicia Cook. Professional Writer. Expert Interview. 11 December 2020.
• ↑ https://annieneugebauer.com/2014/04/21/titling-poems/
• ↑ https://writersrelief.com/blog/2013/08/great-title-for-your-book-or-story-or-poem/
• ↑ https://www.wccnet.edu/learn/departments/engd/writing-center/_documents/punctuation/titles-of-works.pdf

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This section will cover the following topics:

• using quotation marks
• using italics
• not using underlining

What do quotation marks, italics, and underlining look like?

• Quotation marks look like little pairs of commas up in the air (“ ”).  They always come in a set: one before and one after whatever is being enclosed.  For example: “The Lottery” is a very scary story.
• Italics is a typeface, not a symbol.  It is a design that tilts the tops of letters to the right and makes them look fancy, like this: italics.  (The name comes from the fact that the first typefaces designed to look like handwriting came from Italy.)
• Underlining is obvious: underlining .

How do you use these marks?  First, stop using underlining.  The only thing underlined in a document these days is a link to something online.  (One exception: If you are writing by hand, you can use underlining on something you would normally italicize.)

So all you really need to know is how to use quotation marks and italics.

Quotation Marks

Quotation marks (“ ”) enclose words to set them off from the rest of the text.  Quotation marks are used three ways:

• to identify certain types of titles
• to indicate another person’s words, whether written or spoken
• to refer to a word being used as a word  (For example: The word “cat” has three letters.  Putting “cat” in quotes clarifies that we are referring to the word, not the animal.  If we were just talking about the animal, we would not use quotes.  For example:  I had a cat named Maggie.  This use of quotation marks is rare.  Focus on the first two uses, which are much more common.)

Titles in Quotation Marks

Quotation marks are used to identify the titles of short works such as poems, essays, articles, chapters, songs, stories, web pages, TV and radio episodes– anything short enough that is part of something larger like a book, CD, program, or website.  For example:

“Looking for America” by Lana Del Rey (song)

“Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell (essay)

“A Real Durwan” by Jhumpa Lahiri (short story)

“Watering the Stones” by Mary Oliver (poem)

“The Rains of Castamere” (episode in a TV series )

“Blood Gold: The Fight for the Future of Brazil’s Rain Forest” (magazine article)

“Take Action” (page on Cascade AIDS Project’s website)

For the titles of longer works, see “Italics” below.

Quoting Speech

In college, you will write lots of research papers, using the ideas and the words of other people.  The first step is understanding the difference between direct and indirect quotations.

A direct quotation is when you write exactly what someone else said or wrote.  Their words are enclosed in quotation marks.   For example:

The wolf said, “Then I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down.”

According to Gandhi, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”

An indirect quotation is a restatement of what someone said or wrote but using your own words.   Do not use quotation marks for indirect quotations.  For example:

The wolf threatened to destroy the little pig’s house.

Gandhi often said we have to take action if we want the world to be better.

Capitalizing Quotes

Quotes are capitalized just like regular sentences .  The first word in a sentence is capitalized and the first word in a quote is capitalized.

Martie wrote an email saying, “Thank you for the card.  The design was lovely.”  (The words “Thank” and “The” are capitalized because they begin sentences.)

When identifying the speaker in the middle of a quote, the beginning of the second part of the quote does not need to be capitalized unless it is the beginning of a new sentence.  For example:

“Thank you for the card,” Martie wrote in her email. “The design was lovely.” (“The” is capitalized because it is the beginning of the new sentence.)

“Thank you for the card,” Martie wrote, adding, “with the lovely design.”  (The word “with” is not capitalized because the phrase “with the lovely design” is a continuation of the sentence that begins “Thank you for the card.”)

Placement of Quotation Marks

Quotation marks go at the beginning and the end of the quote.   This is true even if a quote goes on for two or more sentences.  Generally, no additional quotation marks are needed in between.  For example:

My sister said, “Your dog ran away again.  I found him, but he was wet and muddy.  The next time he runs away, get him yourself.”

However, if the quote is interrupted with explanatory words, the quotation marks go around the quoted words to separate them from the explanation.  For example:

My sister said, “Your dog ran away again.”  I could tell she was really angry.  “I found him, but he was wet and muddy,” she continued.  “The next time he runs away, get him yourself.”  Then she slammed the door.

A speaker can be identified at the beginning, middle, or end of a quote.  For example:

Madison said, “Let’s stop at the market to buy fresh vegetables for dinner.”

“Let’s stop at the market,” Madison said.  “We can buy fresh vegetables for dinner.”

“Let’s stop at the market to buy some fresh vegetables for dinner,” Madison said.

When quotation marks are used next to other punctuation , there is a correct order.

• Quotation marks are always placed after commas and periods.   For example:

I love the Billie Eilish song “My Future,” which she sang at the Democratic convention.

• If both the sentence and the quote are statements, put the period inside the end quotes .  For example:

In high school I read “The Lottery .”

• If the sentence is a question or exclamation and the quote is a statement, put the question mark or exclamation point after the end quotes.   For example:

I finally memorized the poem “The Raven “!

• But if the sentence is a statement and the quoted material is a question or exclamation, put the question mark or exclamation point inside the end quotes.   For example:

I asked the teacher, “Can you help me ?”

Single quotation marks (‘ ’) are only used to indicate a quotation within another quotation.   For example:

Theresa said, “I wanted to take my dog to the music festival, but the man at the gate said, ‘ No dogs allowed, ’ so I took Pepper home.”

Using quotation marks correctly requires practice.  Keep these rules nearby and check them when you want to use quotation marks.

Use quotation marks for the titles of small things that are part of something larger.

Use italics for the titles of large things.

Never use both quotation marks and italics.  It’s always one or the other.

Use italics to identify titles of long works (books, plays, newspapers, magazines, albums and CDs, websites, movies and DVDs, TV and radio series), as well as the names of ships and aircraft, and foreign words.   For example:

Books and plays: To Kill a Mockingbird, Hamlet, The Hobbit

Magazines and newspapers:  The New York Times, Rolling Stone

Movies and DVDs:  Casablanca, Moonlight, Vivo

Websites:  Craig’s List, Common Sense Media, Khan Academy, TED

TV & radio series:  Stranger Things, SNL, Morning Edition

Albums and CDs:  Abbey Road by The Beatles, American Idiot by Green Day

Video games:  Super Mario 3D World, Minecraft

Ships and aircraft:  Enterprise, Spruce Goose

Foreign words:  The Italian word ciao is used when greeting people or saying goodbye.

• Use quotation marks to enclose direct quotes and the titles of short works.
• Use italics for the titles of long works and foreign words.
• Don’t use underlining for anything other than live links.
• Never use both italics and quotes; it’s always one or the other.

Quotation Marks, Italics, and Underlining Copyright © by Yvonne Kane; Krista O'Brien; and Angela Wood is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Punctuation with Titles

Note: This post relates to content in the eighth edition of the MLA Handbook . For up-to-date guidance, see the ninth edition of the MLA Handbook .

In a previous Ask the MLA post, we explained how to incorporate titles ending in question marks or exclamation points into works-cited-list entries . But how do you incorporate such titles into your prose? How do you handle titles ending in other punctuation marks? And what should you do about other matters of punctuation related to titles?

Titles Ending in Question Marks or Exclamation Points in Your Prose

At the MLA, we never insert a period after a title ending in a question mark or exclamation point, but we insert a comma if doing so makes a sentence easier to read—for example, when such a title is one item in a series or when the title is contained in a nonrestrictive clause:

“I just saw Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , Oklahoma! , and Design for Living ,” Roland said.

The center hopes its 1992 theme, Explore New Worlds—Read!, will draw attention to geography.

But when possible, we prefer to reword:

The center hopes to draw attention to geography with its 1992 theme, Explore New Worlds—Read!

Titles That Need to Be Shortened 

When we need to shorten a really long title in a works-cited-list entry, we add an ellipsis after the first part of the title up to at least the first noun. If a work has an alternative title, we might include it. If a period is needed, we insert the period before the ellipsis and set the punctuation roman:

Bulwer, John.  Philocophus; or, The Deafe and Dumbe Mans Friend. . . .      Humphrey Mosely, 1648.

If a comma is needed, as it would be when the long title is the title of a container, we insert it after the ellipsis. We set the ellipsis and the comma roman:

Smith, Ann. Introduction.  Philocophus; or, The Deafe and Dumbe Mans Friend . . .  , Humphrey Mosely, 1648, pp. x-xxi.

In prose, we omit the ellipsis:

Philocophus; or, The Deafe and Dumbe Mans Friend  was written by John Bulwer.

Titles Ending in an Ellipsis or Dash

If the ellipsis is part of the title, we add the period or comma after the ellipsis. The ellipsis is set in italics if the title is italicized, but the additional punctuation is set roman:

One of the most popular comic films of the 1980s was Rob Reiner’s When Harry Met Sally . . . . One of the most popular comic films of the 1980s was When Harry Met Sally . . . , directed by Rob Reiner. Work Cited Reiner, Rob, director. When Harry Met Sally . . . . MGM, 1989.

We follow the same principle if a title ends in a dash:

A well-known poem about death is Emily Dickinson’s “I heard a Fly buzz—when I died—.” A well-known poem about death is “I heard a Fly buzz—when I died—,” by Emily Dickinson. Work Cited Dickinson, Emily. “I heard a Fly buzz—when I died—.” The Poems of Emily Dickinson , edited by R. W. Franklin, Harvard UP, 1999.

Titles and Subtitles

Section 1.2.1 of the eighth edition of the MLA Handbook says, “Use a colon and a space to separate a title from a subtitle, unless the title ends in a question mark or an exclamation point. Include other punctuation only if it is part of the title or subtitle.”

The handbook provides the following examples:

Storytelling and Mythmaking: Images from Film and Literature

Whose Music? A Sociology of Musical Language

But sometimes titles are not straightforward. In such cases, we follow some additional rules.

For example, when a title is followed by two subtitles, we use two colons:

Finis Coronat Opus: A Curious Reciprocity: Shelley’s “When the Lamp Is Shattered”

When a period separates a title and a subtitle on the title page, we change the period to a colon. When a question mark, exclamation point, or dash separates a title and a subtitle on the title page, we leave the original mark:

On the title page: The East End. The Story of a Neighborhood

In your prose: The East End: The Story of a Neighborhood

Both on the title page and in your prose: What Do I Know? An Account of an Investigation

But if a title contains a title ending in a question mark or exclamation point, we add a colon:

Moby-Dick and Absalom, Absalom! : Two American Masterpieces

Here the exclamation point is part of the title Absalom, Absalom! , so a colon is needed to separate the title Moby-Dick and Absalom, Absalom! from the subtitle.

Double Titles

For an alternative or double title in English beginning with or , we follow the first example given in section 8.165 of The Chicago Manual of Style and punctuate as follows:

England’s Monitor; or, The History of the Separation (452)

But no semicolon is needed for a title in English that ends with a question mark or exclamation point:

“Getting Calliope through Graduate School? Can Chomsky Help? or, The Role of Linguistics in Graduate Education in Foreign Languages”

For double titles of foreign language publications, we follow the source.

Dates in Titles

Unless a date is part of a title’s syntax, we follow section 8.163 of Chicago and set it off with a comma:

Melodrama Unveiled: American Theater and Culture, 1800–1850 (451)

Serial Comma in Titles

Contrary to section 8.163 of Chicago , for English-language titles of books published in the United States, we add the serial comma before the conjunction preceding the final item in a series if the comma is missing. Otherwise, we follow the source. The following book was published by Verso in London, so the serial comma is not added:

Buelens, Geert. Everything to Nothing: The Poetry of the Great War, Revolution and the Transformation of Europe. Verso, 2015.

Works Cited

The Chicago Manual of Style . 16th ed., U of Chicago P, 2016.

MLA Handbook . 8th ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2016.

90 Comments

Omar 22 october 2017 at 07:10 am.

Dear Jennifer, I have a question regarding the use of semi-colons in the subtitle of report headlines. Specifically, I'd like to know whether or not the first word after the semi-colon should be capitalized. I know that the first word after the subtitle typically begins with a capital letter as per Chicago and AP rules, but the AP is silent on what to do when the subtitle is itself separated by a semi-colon. Is the below headline acceptable?

Hurricanes 2017: Galeforce winds batter UK; Flood warnings issued nationwide

Your e-mail address will not be published

Jennifer A. Rappaport 23 October 2017 AT 12:10 PM

Great question. MLA style, following Chicago , capitalizes the first letter of the first and last words of a title and the first letter of any other words in the title unless they are articles or prepositions, so in your example, we would capitalize not only "Flood" but also all the other words in the title: "Hurricanes 2017: Galeforce Winds Batter UK; Flood Warnings Issued Nationwide." (Note that "galeforce" is not in Webster's so if we were crafting this title we would style it "Gale-Force Winds," but if it were a published title, we would follow copy.)

Amy W 05 January 2018 AT 09:01 AM

What would you do if the title with a question mark was in quotes, rather than italicized? Would the comma go inside or outside the quotation mark? "...?," Or "...?",

Jennifer A. Rappaport 08 January 2018 AT 09:01 AM

The comma would be placed inside the quotation marks.

Colleen 24 April 2018 AT 02:04 PM

Where would the commas go if I listed multiple titles that had quotation marks? Ex. I read "Riding the Rails," "The Long Road to Oregon," and "Coming out West." Is that correct with the commas and period inside the quotation marks?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 24 April 2018 AT 08:04 PM

Yes, correct. Please see our related post for examples: style.mla.org/punctuation-and-quotation-marks/

Amy Nelson 26 January 2018 AT 05:01 PM

When the title of the work being cited in the WC list includes the title of another text (for example, the cited work is titled A Critical Edition of John Lydgate's _Life of Our Lady_, with the last four words in the title -- here set apart with underscores -- being the title of a long poem and thus italicized), should the secondary / interior title be italicized along with the main title, or should it be formatted in standard typeface in contrast with the main title's italics?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 31 January 2018 AT 09:01 AM

Thanks for your question. The answer is on p. 71 of the handbook (1.2.4 "Titles within Titles").

Patricia Bostian 20 February 2018 AT 12:02 PM

Can't find an answer for citing a title within a title when it comes at the end. This is for a citation: "An Overview of 'A Rose for Emily'." OR "An Overview of 'A Rose for Emily.'"

Jennifer A. Rappaport 21 February 2018 AT 12:02 PM

Great question. The period goes inside the single quotation mark.

Karen 12 March 2018 AT 12:03 AM

I have an issue with a document on line that I want to call attention to. This document has several sections or parts and each section or part has a name/header/sort of title. I need to mention the name/header/title of each section in this document. Should I put the names/headers/titles of each section in quotations or italics? How should I punctuate this? Also, to do certain things with this document, you have to navigate through it, for example: click "Save and finish later" or click "Next". Should these "Click" buttons be in quotation marks or italics as well? Thank you for your help.

Jennifer A. Rappaport 13 March 2018 AT 02:03 PM

Thanks for your question. We'll submit it to Ask the MLA.

Renee 15 March 2018 AT 10:03 PM

When citing an article title that contains periods, should the periods be omitted? For example: In the article "That's No Woman. That's My Wife.," the author states...

That's No Woman. That's My Wife. is the title, but the punctuation doesn't look correct. Thank you!

Jennifer A. Rappaport 16 March 2018 AT 07:03 AM

Good question. We'll submit it to Ask the MLA.

Frank 27 July 2018 AT 07:07 PM

Jennifer, thanks for this wonderful and useful piece. One issue I'm still confused about is how to handle the mid-sentence appearance of titles containing a single comma. (Some examples: Lust, Caution ; White Hunter, Black Heart ; New York, New York .

To consider the last example, I know that I would write a non-title version of the phrase as follows:

• I took a trip to New York, New York, and had a wonderful time.

But is this the correct way to place the title in the middle of a sentence?

• We watched the Scorsese film New York, New York and really enjoyed it.

Is no comma required at the end of the title to "close out" the comma in the middle?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 30 July 2018 AT 06:07 AM

Thanks for your question. Whereas a comma is needed before and after the state in formulations such as "New York, New York," when the city and state are used as the title of a work, no comma is needed following the name of the state, unless the grammar of the rest of the sentence requires it (After watching the movie New York, New York , we went out to dinner).

Alethia 14 August 2018 AT 03:08 PM

Is it common to place an additional comma between the year and time in a subtitle? i.e. meeting announcement August 21, 2018, 1:30 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. (EST)

Jennifer A. Rappaport 15 August 2018 AT 07:08 AM

Yes, a comma should generally separate a date from a time.

Cynthia Crosbie 30 August 2018 AT 12:08 AM

How would you punctuate this sermon title: “Building Wisely,” Part 1 Should Part 1 be written as part of the title? italicized? in parentheses? Should Part 1 be left off and only Part 2 and Part 3 written?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 03 September 2018 AT 06:09 PM

Thanks for your question. In MLA style, "part 1" would be included in the "Number" slot on the MLA format template:

https://style.mla.org/works-cited-a-quick-guide/

ML Corwin 08 November 2018 AT 04:11 PM

The author of this book has put colons after the chapter numbers followed by the chapter title. Three chapters are each about one of three "Power Blockers." How to punctuate those? Which of two styles is preferable? Use a second colon or not?

Chapter 6: Power Blocker #3 Misplaced Blame

Chapter 6: Power Blocker #3: Misplaced Blame

Jennifer A. Rappaport 09 November 2018 AT 09:11 AM

There's no hard-and-fast rule about how to style chapter numbers before titles, but in a table of contents, I would recommend the following in the example you've sent:

Chapter 6. Power Blocker #3: Misplaced Blame

Andrew Johnston 29 November 2018 AT 02:11 PM

My question concerns the title of an academic publication.

In my situation, the title concludes with a question and the subtitle gives further clarification.

How can I distinguish the title from the subtitle?

For example:

Competition Law within the European Union is Functioning Just Fine, but do fines cut it?: An exploration of the efficacy of corporate fines in achieving the goals of EU Competition Law, and the potential benefits of reform.

Competition Law within the European Union is Functioning Just Fine, but do fines cut it? An exploration of the efficacy of corporate fines in achieving the goals of EU Competition Law, and the potential benefits of reform.

I look forward to having this one resolved.

Jennifer A. Rappaport 30 November 2018 AT 08:11 AM

Thanks for your question. The question mark separates the title from the subtitle.

Competition Law within the European Union Is Functioning Just Fine, but Do Fines Cut It? An Exploration of the Efficacy of Corporate Fines in Achieving the Goals of EU Competition Law, and the Potential Benefits of Reform.

Sue 05 December 2018 AT 05:12 AM

Hi there, We are trying to figure out how to punctuate a role title. For example,

You are invited to be an Organization Lead at xyz company.

Should 'Organization Lead' have quotation marks like "Organization Lead" or single quotations or none at all?

And if a course title, do I add 'xx' or "xx" as well in a phrase? For example, Access "Digital Marketing" today.

Thank you for your help!

Jennifer A. Rappaport 05 December 2018 AT 07:12 AM

Thanks for your question. In MLA style, quotation marks are not used around professional titles or titles of courses. We also lowercase professional titles: organization lead.

Stevie D 11 December 2018 AT 04:12 PM

When using a short story title within a paper's title, and before a subtitle, where does the colon belong?

"A Rose for Emily:" Northern Progress Meets Southern Tradition or "A Rose for Emily": Northern Progress Meets Southern Tradition

Thanks for your help!

Jennifer A. Rappaport 11 December 2018 AT 07:12 PM

The colon goes after the title in quotation marks:

“A Rose for Emily”: Northern Progress Meets Southern Tradition

Shari 14 January 2019 AT 10:01 PM

Thank you so much for your help Jennifer, but what if the title is an analysis of a book. For example, about animals in Harry Potter?

Can I write:

Anthropomorphisation and Animal representation: A post humanistic analysis of Harry Potter.

Is this the right format for MLA?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 15 January 2019 AT 06:01 AM

Thanks for your question. The correct styling in MLA format would be

Anthropomorphization and Animal Representation: A Posthumanistic Analysis of the Harry Potter Books (since Harry Potter is the name of a series of books, not the name of a particular book).

Christine Dushack 22 January 2019 AT 12:01 PM

For the following, does the period go inside the quotation marks or outside? It is a title of a paper.

For questions 3-10, refer to "The Beetle Juice". Or For questions 3-10, refer to "The Beetle Juice."

Jennifer A. Rappaport 22 January 2019 AT 12:01 PM

Thanks for your question. See our answer here:

https://style.mla.org/punctuation-and-quotation-marks/

Mark 02 February 2019 AT 10:02 AM

While I understand how to punctuate a question, I'm a bit confuse as to the proper rule regarding titles that do not indicate it's a question but rather an answer.

For example, there are plenty of "how to" posts that do not have any punctation in the title.

How to prepare for a snowstorm

How do I prepare for a snowstorm?

I would think the proper way is ...

How to prepare for a snowstorm. (with a period)

But I'm finding several major newspapers and magazines do not punctuate these titles with a period. It seems to me it creates a conflict with citing sources using proper punctuations. Can you clarify how MLA handles this?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 03 February 2019 AT 08:02 AM

Thanks for your question. We would style the title as follows:

How to Prepare for a Snowstorm

Calla Andrews 26 March 2019 AT 02:03 PM

Does one need a period after a title ending with a question mark when the title is the end of the sentence? For example: We were analyzing the short story "Who's Afraid of the Storm?" I think that's enough punctuation, but should there be a period after the quotes? With a non-question mark title, the period for the end of the sentence would go inside the quotes.

Jennifer A. Rappaport 26 March 2019 AT 04:03 PM

A question mark is indeed enough punctuation in your example. There should be no period after the closing quotation mark.

Carly Bondár 02 April 2019 AT 01:04 PM

Hi there. I have a question about listing book titles that have commas in their titles. For example, I want to list four book titles in a single sentence, but two of the books have commas in the titles. How do I write out the list so as to be clear about which commas are part of the titles and which are separating items in a list? Do I use semicolons? It doesn't look right. As of now the only thing distinguishing the commas in the titles from the commas used as list separators is that the former are italicized and the latter are not. I just worry this isn't clear enough when the font is small.

Jennifer A. Rappaport 03 April 2019 AT 07:04 AM

Great question, Carly. You have it exactly right: the commas between the titles are not italicized, so those commas separate one title from another.

Eitan 03 July 2019 AT 07:07 PM

In my academic field, I often see titles that include some made-up system name, a colon, and a short description of the system. Something like: "Gizmo: a great new way to do things". Is there a name or term for the first word in this title, the system name? It's clearly not the subtitle or the title, but is there anything else I can call it?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 15 July 2019 AT 12:07 PM

In this case, "Gizmo" is the title, and "A Great New Way to Do Things" is the subtitle.

Jesse P 14 July 2019 AT 07:07 PM

Hi, I'm wondering what to do when a question inside quotation marks is the first half of a title (i.e. followed by a subtitle). I see that it says here, “Use a colon and a space to separate a title from a subtitle, unless the title ends in a question mark or an exclamation point. Include other punctuation only if it is part of the title or subtitle.” However, does that still hold true when the title is in quotation marks? In that case might the colon be added back (since technically the quotation mark would make for a barrier between the question mark and the colon so they wouldn't be directly in a row)? Or still no? For example: "A Man for All Seasons?" Reflections on John Wayne OR "A Man for All Seasons?": Reflections on John Wayne

Jennifer A. Rappaport 15 July 2019 AT 01:07 PM

We retain the colon:

"A Man for All Seasons?": Reflections on John Wayne

David Charles Burt 29 July 2019 AT 03:07 PM

I need advice on how to use commas in a title of a piece I've written for an American publication. The title is: From Brass Pins Pistols and Swords to Warships.

How are the commas to be placed in this title ? David Burt, England.

Izabel 02 December 2019 AT 11:12 PM

Hi! I'm an artist (a painter) and sometimes I have two names, or titles, for my paintings. How to write it correctly? Usually I just place it in quotation, for example: "The painting one", or "The painting two". I'm originally from Russia, and we have these punctuation rules (with comma before 'or' with double titles), but I doubt it is correct in English. Please, help.

Jennifer A. Rappaport 03 December 2019 AT 07:12 AM

Thanks for your question. We also have rules in English for punctuating double titles. See the section "Double Titles" above.

Zaine Pittman 10 December 2019 AT 04:12 PM

Hello, I have a question. What if there is a book with a title that has the article "The" in it. When you write it on a document or something, would you put the article after the full title, and separate the article and end of the title with a comma? for example, "Maze of Bones, The"?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 11 December 2019 AT 07:12 AM

Thanks for your question. In prose and works-cited-lists, the article should remain at the start of the title, but in an index, it would likely be listed as Maze of Bones, The.

Kara Wood 09 January 2020 AT 07:01 PM

I have a list of newspaper article titles that are being analyzed by some high school students; naturally, one of the article titles ends with a question mark. What is MLA's rule on this?

Here's the opening to his précis:

In his 2019 articles “Sea Level Rise Could Claim Mar-a-Lago — and Trump’s empire,” “U.S. Women’s Soccer Players Shouldn’t be Paid as Much as Men. They Should Get More.,” and “What Can a Black Person do to Keep from Getting Killed by Police in this Country?” American columnist Eugene Robinson unabashedly addresses various controversial topics, ranging from the everyday lunch conversation starter, climate change, to the heated, yet popular political campaign platforms of gender and racial discrimination in order to . . .

Jennifer A. Rappaport 15 January 2020 AT 07:01 AM

Thanks for your question. We would insert a comma between the question mark and the closing quotation mark because it makes the sentence easier to read.

Reb 03 March 2020 AT 04:03 PM

If a book title within an article title is not italicized should this be corrected in the citation?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 04 March 2020 AT 06:03 AM

Thanks for your question. See section 1.2.4 of the eighth edition of the MLA Handbook .

christina 03 March 2020 AT 07:03 PM

Is it correct if I were to have my title with a colon and a question mark? If so, do I add a space between?

Thanks for your question. A colon and a question mark should not generally appear next to each other in a title. So, for instance, if a title ends in a question mark and the title is followed by a subtitle, do not add a colon between the title and the subtitle. See the example above: Whose Music? A Sociology of Musical Language .

Reb 04 March 2020 AT 11:03 AM

Thanks but 1.2.4 does not address my question. Yes, a book title within a journal article title should be italicized. But if the book title is NOT italicized in the actual journal article, do I make that correction in my works cited page?

Jennifer A. Rappaport 05 March 2020 AT 07:03 AM

Thanks for the clarification. If the book title is not italicized in the journal article, do not italicize it. Copy the article title as it appears in the source.

Reb 05 March 2020 AT 05:03 PM

Jeff dailey 17 april 2020 at 08:04 am.

I want to title a play with a long title and need your thoughts on both my chosen punctuation and capitalization and thank you. Here is my title: An Angel with Flowers, Broadway Bound in Twenty-Seventeen, B.C. [Before COVID-19]

Jennifer A. Rappaport 20 April 2020 AT 06:04 AM

Thanks for your question. You might consider An Angel with Flowers: Broadway-Bound in 2017 BC (before COVID-19)

Julie 27 April 2020 AT 11:04 AM

Should university course titles be punctuated if they are mentioned in a letter?

For example: "I look Introduction to Film last spring, and it helped me understand movies."

Thank you for such a helpful forum!

Jennifer A. Rappaport 28 April 2020 AT 07:04 AM

Thanks for your question. In MLA style, course titles are set roman without quotation marks, so your example is correct.

Ricardo Bravo 29 June 2020 AT 10:06 AM

Hi There, Names of restaurants, theaters should be in italic as well? Best and thanks!

Jennifer A. Rappaport 29 June 2020 AT 03:06 PM

Thanks for your question. Names of restaurants and theaters should be styled roman without quotation marks.

Mark 22 August 2020 AT 10:08 AM

Good Day Jennifer, is it a grammer law that you Must put a question mark at the end of your title if the title is a question...I"m just trying to find out the Pros and Con"s and the benefits of using the question mark in this type title.

Jennifer A. Rappaport 29 August 2020 AT 08:08 AM

Thanks for your comment. It's probably a good idea to include a question mark if you are creating a title that is a question.

Valerie Exar 06 October 2020 AT 09:10 AM

Hello, For the title of a paper I'm writing:

A Comparison of Water Supply in Houston, TX and Baltimore, MD

Do I put a comma after TX, as I would insert within the body of the paper? (Same question would apply if I spelled out the state names)

Jennifer A. Rappaport 07 October 2020 AT 07:10 AM

Thanks for your question. Yes, there should be a comma after "TX" or after "Texas."

Madeline Patrick 14 October 2020 AT 03:10 PM

Hello, Jennifer A. Rappaport. As a high school junior enrolled in a college class, I want to, well, I want to show off to my classmates. I mustn't have errors! After some reading online, I have received mixed answers on whether or not I can put a period at the end of a précis title for emphasis. Could you help me?

With many thank yous, Madeline A. Patrick

Jennifer A. Rappaport 15 October 2020 AT 08:10 AM

Thanks for your question. A title should not end in a period.

Samantha Hanna 10 December 2020 AT 11:12 AM

What would you put after by in the title?

By: someone? A

By; someone? B

By, someone? C

Jennifer A. Rappaport 10 December 2020 AT 11:12 AM

Thanks for your question. Are you referring to the byline rather than the title? If so, there should be no punctuation between "by" and the author's name.

Patrick Love 23 February 2021 AT 12:02 PM

Thank you for your post. I have a question concerning how to punctuate a short story title, but I am trying to add an apostrophe "s" to the title. I am trying to make this sentence: "The Necklace's" ending is an example of situational irony because ...

So I am wondering if it is correct to add the apostrophe "s" inside of the quotation marks or should it be added outside of the quotation marks?

Thank you for your time, Patrick

C. Barney Latimer 09 March 2021 AT 10:03 AM

The apostrophe and "s" go after the title’s closing quotation mark (“The Necklace”’s). However, an easier and more readable solution would be to reword the sentence to avoid this awkward use of the possessive: The ending of “The Necklace” is an example of situational irony because. . . .

Judy Lee 06 May 2021 AT 09:05 AM

I think a period is needed at the end of the following sentence: The peddler went up, took out a scroll, and showed him the verse “Who is the man who desires life […]?” (Psalms 34:13). What say you? Thanks.

Chris Davis 19 May 2021 AT 02:05 PM

How do you punctuate a title and subtitle that are BOTH questions?

A Water-Proof Phone?: Is There a Market for Water Resistant Smartphones? OR A Water-Proof Phone? Is There a Market for Water Resistant Smartphones?

C. Barney Latimer 25 May 2021 AT 04:05 PM

When the main title of a work ends in a question mark or exclamation point, no colon precedes the subtitle, even if the subtitle also ends in a question mark or exclamation point. The correct format for your example is therefore “A Waterproof Phone? Is There a Market for Water-Resistant Smartphones?” Note that no period follows the question mark at the end of the subtitle when the title appears at the end of the sentence. However, if a title ending in a question mark appears in the middle of a sentence, a comma may be used if it makes the sentence easier to read, as in this example: “After reading ‘A Waterproof Phone? Is There a Market for Water-Resistant Smartphones?,’ I accidentally dropped my smartphone in the bath.”

W. 16 October 2021 AT 01:10 PM

If the title of a work appears at the end of a sentence, where does the period go? before or after the quotations marks for the work? B) Aesop uses allegory and satire to expose humanity’s ego in his fable, “The Fox and the Grapes”. or B) Aesop uses allegory and satire to expose humanity’s ego in his fable, “The Fox and the Grapes.”

Wyatt F. 18 November 2021 AT 09:11 AM

How would you punctuate a title that exclaims itself?

Ammy 23 November 2021 AT 09:11 AM

How the author can enter the number/part of the paper in the title of their essay/monograph/article for publication in a journal. The MLA Template shows the sequence of writing the numbering when quoting/referring someone's work; but it does not answer the question of how the author should compose their title correctly when the work is divided into parts. For example:

1// Short Title: A Long Subheading Containing Ten Words—Paper 1 of (a/the?) Historical Jesus Review Series

2// Short Title: A Long Subheading Containing Ten Words Part 2 of Historical Jesus Review Series /as second line/

3// Short Title: A Long Subheading Containing Ten Words. Part 3 of Historical Jesus Review Series

4//Short Title: A Very Long Subheading Containing Fourteen Words. I Short Title: A Very Long Subheading Containing Fourteen Words. II

How it is advisable to design the numbering itself: Article 1, Essay 2, Part 3, IV, or just Paper 5?

The question is fundamental and will help many people who divide their articles into parts. Thank you for your comprehensive responsiveness.

Christin Bonin 17 January 2022 AT 08:01 AM

I am about to publish my dissertation. The Title is: The Broadway Belt The Musical Diva and her Belt Voice from Technical, Ethnic, and Feminist Perspectives Now my big question: Oxford Comma after Ethnic/before and ... or not?

Aliaa Bondok 09 February 2022 AT 08:02 PM

Hello! Unfortunately, I could not find an answer to my question in the MLA guide, so here is it: How do I punctuate a certain quote take from a novel when I include this quote in a title, heading, or sub-heading? Should I capitalize the words of the quote or just copy them as they are in the novel? Example: the original quote reads: “a future of poverty and despondency” I want to include it in a subheading a) Escaping “a future of poverty and despondency” b) Escaping "a Future of Poverty and Despondency" Which version is correct, (a) or (b)?

Thanks in advance!

Pallavi 20 April 2022 AT 12:04 PM

Is this title correct ?

Prone to dominance and criminality ? : The scientist figure in selected films

Russ 21 April 2022 AT 01:04 PM

My book title contains a colon, but I am told that the title, when placed on the book cover, binding and title page, should be written without the colon. I am confused!

Jadyn 03 October 2022 AT 06:10 PM

If the title is inside quotation marks at the end of a sentence (Example: This is discussed in the book "Mindset: The New Psychology of Success") Does the period go inside or outside the quotation?

Laura Kiernan 24 October 2022 AT 04:10 PM

Thanks for your question. In MLA style, titles of books are italicized, so, in the example you supplied, you wouldn't surround Mindset: The New Psychology of Success in quotation marks. For guidance on punctuation around titles, see section 2.105 of the ninth edition of the MLA Handbook .

Nour 30 October 2022 AT 05:10 PM

Hi i have a question regarding article titles is it : Study Suggests Video Games Can Help Mental Health. or Study Suggests Video Games Can Help Mental Health with ponctuation or without ponctuation ??

Kristina 03 October 2023 AT 01:10 PM

Hi there, I'm working on a subtitle for my children's book. Title: A children's picture book about monsters (or perhaps not-so-scary monsters) I would use caps, but I'm not exactly certain which words wouldn't be capitalized other than or? I'm wondering if you can use parenthesis in a book subtitle? Originally I was thinking about using the line: A children's picture book about scary monsters (or ARE they)? Again, I'm not sure about the parenthesis or ending a book subtitle with a question mark. I've seen one so far and they placed the question mark inside the parenthesis and didn't have any punctuation after the parenthesis. Just wanted to get your advice. Thanks so much!

Uma Maheswari 08 November 2023 AT 09:11 PM

I want to frame a question in MLA style. Which one is correct regarding the question mark at the end? What is the significance of the title of the poem "An African Elegy"? What is the significance of the title of the poem "An African Elegy?" Note: The title of the poem does not have a question mark. It is mine. Thank you

Laura Kiernan 09 November 2023 AT 04:11 PM

Thank you for your question about MLA style. For guidance, see section 6.53 of the ninth edition of the MLA Handbook .

Emma 17 February 2024 AT 09:02 AM

In my list of works cited, titles of self-contained sources need to be italized, now my question is, does the period right after it have to be italized as well or just the title? Thank you!

Noir 27 March 2024 AT 07:03 PM

Can I include a period at the end of a sentence for a title?

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Do I italicize the title of a short story? What about poem titles?

Titles of individual short stories and poems go in quotation marks. The titles of short story and poetry collections should be italicized. For example, “The Intruder,” a short story by Andre Dubus appears in his collection, Dancing After Hours .

This can get a little tricky when authors title their collection after a story within that collection. Junot Diaz’s collection of stories Drown includes a story titled “Drown.” In this case, the use of italics or quotation marks can help the reader understand what’s being referenced—the entire book or the individual story.

This usage remains true even when titles appear within quotations. Let’s say you write a poem about a poem and you title it this way:

Lines after Reading “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”

Now, you need to enclose the entire title of the poem within quotations when you mention this poem in a cover letter. The title that appears within the title, then, should be enclosed in single quotation marks:

“Lines after Reading ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’”

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Italics and Underlining in English

One of the problems, when we learn English online , is the confusion that surrounds the type of punctuation and formatting used when referring to written works such as books, articles, and poems. The same questions also arise when referring to movie, song, and television show titles.

It should be pointed out that there are no hard and fast grammar rules for formatting or punctuating these items; they are a matter of style. Technically a writer can use any formatting they wish, but adhering to a particular style helps ensure readers fully understand what the writer intended.

Some of the confusion arises due to the fact that different publications, institutions, and schools often use different style guides. The major style guides, Chicago Manual of Style , the AMA Manual of Style , and the AP Style Guide generally follow the same rules, but minor variations occur. The variations and idiosyncrasies occur more often in the lesser used or more specialized style guides.

Another source of confusion to some writers derives from their reading experience. Thousands of articles, papers, and publications exist where underlining is used to emphasis text and to indicate book titles and other works. While there is nothing inherently incorrect with using underlines in a paper or article, underlining is considered an obsolete method of formatting and should generally be avoided.

This change in formatting is another example of how the web, the rise of word processors, and other technological advances have changed styles and standards for both formal and informal writings.

In this article we will give you the formatting and punctuation guidelines for a number of specific types of works.

Do You Italicize Book Titles?

Books are considered as complete bodies of work. When writing about a book the title is italicized. It should be noted that italics is used only when the title is used in a text, meaning surrounded by other words. The italics are used to make the title stand apart from the other text.

Italics are not used for title pages and other places where the title stands alone.

The book title rule basically applies to any big or standalone work, such as a newspaper or magazine. Websites are typically considered a standalone work and the web address is italicized.

Do You Italicize Movie Titles?

Movies are considered to be large standalone pieces. They are therefore subject to the same rules as book titles and are italicized when referred to in an article.

Do You Italicize TV Shows?

Television shows present an interesting set of rules. Whether to italicize depends on whether you are referring to the series or an episode.

The series title is italicized; the episode is in quotation marks.

Here’s an example:

My favourite Big Bang Theory episode is “The Proton Regeneration”.

Do You Italicize Article Titles?

Article titles are treated much like an episode of a television show. When discussing the article it is placed in quotation marks. The title of the publication, or website, where the article is found is written in italics.

Do You Italicize Song Titles?

Song titles are treated like articles and television shows. In most cases the song tiles is placed in quotation marks. The album the song comes from is placed in italics.

Do You Italicize Poem Titles?

The titles of poems are generally placed in quotation marks. However, like many aspects of written English there are some exceptions. If you are referring to an epic poem, such as The Iliad , Beowulf, or Paradise Lost , the title is italicized.

Do You Italicize Company Names?

Company names are treated the same as an individual’s name and are not italicized nor placed in quotation marks. Company names are always capitalized.

Underlining Titles

Often writers will ask it you underline books titles, underline movie titles, underline show titles, underline article titles, or underline song titles.

In general, the answer to this is always “no.”

There is nothing wrong with using underlines, but this as we mentioned earlier this is considered an obsolete, outdated formatting tool and should be avoided.

Using underlines in academic papers often counts against the writer’s overall grade since this formatting convention is no longer in the style guide.

General Guidelines

There is little doubt that if you send just a small amount of time looking at various publications you will soon find articles that treat titles of books, movies, songs and other works differently. It is important to note that those writers are not making grammar mistakes but are adhering to a particular style.

If you are in doubt about how to handle titles of works it is always a good idea to ask what style is used.

In all honesty, the main area where differences in formatting can create a problem is in academic work. Fortunately, most colleges and universities are very good at explaining the style they want students to follow.

In general, here are the main rules for formatting and underlining:

– **Large, complete, standalone works such as books, movies, publications, websites, epic poems, operas, and television shows are italicized. ** – Shorter works such as specific episodes of a television series, song titles, poems, short stories, magazine articles, and newspaper articles are surrounded by quotation marks.

While you will still occasionally see book, movie, newspaper and television shows underlined, this is considered an obsolete formatting option and should generally be avoided.

Article related: The Oxford Comma

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Do you underline or italicize the titles of poems?

Generally (though standards ay differ) longer works are italicized and shorter works are in quotes. That's to say that books, be they poems or otherwise, are italicized ( The Iliad , for example, is a poem, but it's italicized). Short stories and shorter poems are in quotes.

For titles of most poems use use quotation marks . Long poems that are often published as stand-alone books (such as epics) should be italicized.

"Ode to a Nightingale"

"The Jabberwocky"

(Underlining is a convention from typewritten or handwritten text, and not generally used in modern machine printed text).

Normally, no. When you refer to a poem by title, you put the title in quotes; for example, "The Raven," by Edgar Allen Poe. An exception would be a very long poem that is a major work in itself, such as The Iliad .

yes, or indent it to set it apart from the rest of your essay

Highlight the title using the mouse, hit "Ctrl+I" hotkey for italics. "Ctrl+B" for bold, "Ctrl+U" for underline.

Add your answer:

Do you underline or italicize the title in a personal narrative piece?

Qutation marks for essays, short stories, poems, movies underline for book titles

Do you underline video titles?

You need to underline or italicize video game titles. Short stories and song titles need to be put in quotation marks.

Do you underline a title of a booklet?

Titles of anothologies should be treated in the same way as the titles of other books, so underline or italicize, depending on what is expected at your school or college.

Do you italicize or underline atricles?

Do you italicize the name of a play.

Guidelines for titles dictate that a work that is large and stand alone be either underlined or italicized. Since a play is a work which can stand on its own, it should be underlined or italicized.

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• Sept. 9, 2024 Updated 8:17 a.m. ET

A painter of luminous figurative compositions, Amy Sherald thinks like a filmmaker. When I visited her Jersey City studio this summer, she put it plainly: “I’m directing in the paintings.”

Sherald became famous after her portrait of the former first lady, Michelle Obama , was unveiled in 2018. Attention grew with Sherald’s portrait of Breonna Taylor , the Black medical worker who was killed in 2020 by police in Louisville, Ky., during a raid on her home. It remains one of the best known pictures of protest and resilience to come out of the Black Lives Matter movement.

But Sherald’s reputation as a portrait painter is misleading. In fact, she almost always invents her subjects. The work begins, she explained, with finding sitters — actors, really — to support characters and stories of her own devising. Her subjects, all Black, are friends, strangers and, lately, people found through casting agents, whom she clothes and poses (often amid props), then submits to hundreds of photographs. In the paintings that result, they generally gaze straight out at the viewer and establish a commanding silence.

Sherald, dressed casually in loose gray pants and a black top when I visited her, borrowed fashion-forward clothing for the lively (and slightly risqué) images of herself accompanying this article. At this point in her life — Sherald just turned 51 — she’s delighted to “rid myself of the critical self I grew up with,” and to reconnect with her inner child. “Let me reintroduce myself,” Sherald wants the photos to say. “This is me being happy.”

Her optimism is rare and sails against the winds of contemporary culture. It is evident in her current work. So, too, are deeper overtones. Both will be fully on view in Sherald’s most comprehensive survey to date, opening Nov. 16 at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art before traveling to the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York next year. Greeting visitors will be her sweeping new painting “Ecclesia (The Meeting of Inheritance and Horizons),” which she has been working on all summer. A triptych, her first, it features a single figure per panel, each framed by a kind of watchtower set against an azure sky. The first word of the title in Greek means “assembly”; more commonly, it’s the root for church, a connection emphasized by the panels’ rounded tops, which evoke ecclesiastic architecture.

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