Moments of Permanence - rrrrrrrrrr

About rrrrrrrrrr

Previous Entry rrrrrrrrrr May. 16th, 2012 @ 02:02 pm Next Entry
So, I'm reading a book. It's non-fiction. And it is annoying me, for one simple reason:

Endnotes.

I hate endnotes. To read an endnote, I have to hold my place with one finger, flick through the book to the endnotes section, finding it before the index and the bibliography and any appendices, find the chapter I'm on, find the number I'm up to - not actually knowing whether this particular endnote is going to be an interesting added point to read, or just "ibid." - and then find my place on the page I'm reading again.

And then I either have to keep repeating this process, or else I have to keep a finger uncomfortably holding my place in the endnotes section.

All of which could be averted by the simple use of footnotes, instead. To read a footnote, I just have to glance down the page.

I realise that, in a pre-computerised era, footnotes were probably quite a challenge of typesetting and layout. However, I pretty much just don't believe that the layout of a text-only work of non-fiction isn't done with software these days, and largely automatically at that. If OpenOffice can insert footnotes trivially, and automagically renumber them when I insert and remove them and so on, then I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that layout software can probably do that too.

There is no excuse for using endnotes. Endnotes are a crime against readers of nonfiction.
Tags:

Leave a comment
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] sqbr
Date: May 16th, 2012 07:31 am (UTC)
(Link)
I totally agree, but I find they can be made slightly less annoying with the use of two bookmarks, or at least one at the endnote section.
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] sami
Date: May 16th, 2012 09:09 am (UTC)
(Link)
bookmark, (n): that thing which fell out and got lost

>.>
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] sqbr
Date: May 16th, 2012 09:56 am (UTC)
(Link)
Hee. I see :D

(nb: most of my "bookmarks" are random bits of paper I ripped off like timetables and stuff. Sometimes ripped in half multiple times as their fellow bookmarks get lost...)

Edited 2012-05-16 09:57 am (UTC)
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] willow
Date: May 16th, 2012 10:47 am (UTC)
(Link)
Zvi uses paperclips, and though I've often been very good w/ bookmarks in the house; I tend to like beautiful ones that would make me cry if I took them OUT of the house and somehow lost them. So I always ended up just memorizing the page. however, FLAT paperclips? (plastic) Are 'teh bomb'. Can even use them to mark the line you're on.
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] trouble
Date: May 16th, 2012 08:09 am (UTC)
(Link)
There is a whole wank about this topic that I'm too tired to get into right now. (I fall on FOOTNOTES YOU EVIL PEOPLE side.)
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] sami
Date: May 16th, 2012 09:11 am (UTC)
(Link)
Whoa, wank? If you're willing, when you're not too tired, I'm curious to hear what's up with that!
[User Picture Icon]
From:[personal profile] stranger
Date: May 17th, 2012 02:28 am (UTC)
(Link)
in a pre-computerised era, footnotes were probably quite a challenge of typesetting and layout

Well, um. I wrote and typed an academic thesis before word processors were more than a twinkle in someone's eye, happily counting out and inserting footnotes on the call-out pages. It wasn't that hard. (Of course, I was younger and more energetic then.) So I'm always offended by endnotes, even when the idea is that purely reference notes would just interrupt the flow of reading. Sometimes an essay anthology, with notes at the end of each essay, isn't too awkward, but the endnotes thing always seems like privileging the editor's effort over the reader's. Which isn't the point of selling books.


(Reply)
(Leave a comment)
Top of Page Powered by Dreamwidth Studios