Hart's Rules

Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford was an authoritative reference book and style guide published in England by Oxford University Press (OUP). Hart's Rules originated as a compilation of rules and standards by Horace Hart over almost three decades during his employment at other printing establishments, but they were first printed as a single broadsheet page for in-house use by the OUP in 1893 while Hart was Controller of the University Press. They were originally intended as a concise style-guide for the staff of the OUP, but they developed continuously over the years, were published in 1904, and soon gained wider use as a source for authoritative instructions on typesetting style, grammar, punctuation and usage.

Publishing history

After their first appearance, Hart's rules were reissued in a second edition in 1894, and two further editions in 1895. They were continually revised, enlarged and reissued, and had reached their 15th edition by the time they were eventually published as a book in March 1904. New editions and reprints continued to appear over almost eight decades, until the 39th edition (1983) which was reprinted four times (with corrections)—the last in 1989.

In February 2002, Oxford University Press published a new and much longer edition (the fortieth) of Hart's Rules under the title The Oxford Guide to Style, promoted as "Hart's Rules for the 21st Century", which is of more value to editors than to typesetters. From this version was adapted New Hart's Rules: The Handbook of Style for Writers and Editors, first published in September 2005.

The Oxford Style Manual (2003) combined in a single volume of 1033 pages The Oxford Guide to Style (2002) and The Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors (2000).^[1] It again provided considerably more information about editing style than Hart's Rules did, but also less about typography.

The Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors, compiled by Robert Ritter, was earlier published as a separate companion volume, in line with the eleven editions of its famous predecessor the Authors’ and Printers’ Dictionary by Frederick Howard Collins (first published in 1905 and renamed in 1983). A freshly compiled successor, published in 2005, returned to the "traditional small handbook form" and is titled The New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors. It is intended for "people who work with words—authors, copy-editors, proofreaders, students writing essays and dissertations, journalists, people writing reports or other documents, and website editors."^[2]

British and international alternatives

The Oxford is not the only academic publishing style guide, nor even the only British one.

• The Cambridge University Press publishes COPY-EDITING: The Cambridge Handbook for Editors, Authors and Publishers (3rd edition 1992 reprinted ... 2003) by Judith Butcher (ISBN 0521400740). A fourth edition, fully revisited and updated, was issued 2006, featuring two co-authors: Caroline Drake and Maureen Leach. Now the title reads Butcher's copy-editing : the Cambridge handbook for editors, copy-editors and proofreaders (ISBN 0521847133).

• The Times, a newspaper with an august heritage, published in 2003 its own book, The Times Style and Usage Guide compiled by Tim Austin of that paper's staff and with an introduction by its then editor, Robert Thomson. (ISBN 0723010455)

• The Economist, a weekly news journal, published in 2005 the 9th edition of its own book, The Economist Style Guide (published by Profile Books, ISBN 1861979169).

• The Modern Humanities Research Association published in 2008 the MHRA Style Guide (ISBN 0947623760).

American equivalents

The Oxford publications may be very loosely regarded as the nearest UK equivalents of the US works The Elements of Style ("Strunk & White") and The Chicago Manual of Style. However, none of these works corresponds exactly to the others. Strunk and White mainly covers prose writing and usage – thus corresponding more closely to works such as Fowler's Modern English Usage (in print in three major editions over 80 years – and also published by Oxford University Press). The Chicago Manual of Style does not include a dictionary, as it expects users to refer to the Webster dictionaries. Words into Type (3rd edition), another guide for editors, covers copy-editing, grammar, word usage, and manuscript format. Although last updated in 1974, it remains in print.

Comparable to the guides issued by The Times and The Economist are The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage and perhaps Lapsing Into a Comma: A Curmudgeon's Guide to the Many Things That Can Go Wrong in Print - And How to Avoid Them by Bill Walsh, who is (as is advertised clearly on the book's cover) Copy Desk Chief on the Business Desk at The Washington Post.

See also

• The King's English
• Fowler's Modern English Usage

References

• The Oxford Manual of Style (OUP, 2002) Introduction
• The Meaning of Everything (OUP, 2003)
• History of editions of Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford

External links

• Hart's Rules website
• Biography of Horace Hart
• More information on New Hart's Rules from OUP's web site