Everyday Canvas

The Use of the Ellipsis

Prompt: Let's talk about those lovely ellipsis points. Do you think they suggest faltered or fragmented speech? Should they be saved for confusion, distress or the big reveal. Do you use them when you write? How about with dialogue, are they best used when one speaker interrupts another?

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I use the ellipsis to show stuttering, small pauses, hesitation, mood change, suspense, thoughts trailing off, interruption, and rarely, instead of an exclamation mark when there is no exclamation but the sentence itself can be taken as an exclamation. As with everything else, however, the use of these points should be exercised with reservation. Too much of anything in one piece is just too much.

In addition, ellipses are handy devices to use in quoting a large piece of material when we want to leave a section or sections of the material out. I sometimes use this, too.

Occasionally, if and when the emotional impact is not that great, a semicolon or a comma is used in place of ellipsis, as an ellipsis adds more emotion.
Example: Some schools and a few public libraries ban some books as immoral, to show the public their own shame.
Some schools and a few public libraries ban several books as immoral…to show the public their own shame.

In the old way of using the ellipsis, it was close to taboo to use it in the beginning of a sentence, but nowadays many writers use it when there is an omission, be it in the beginning, middle, or the end of a sentence. So, if an old English teacher berates a student for using the ellipsis in the beginning of the sentence, it is because she was taught that way, and not because the student’s use of it is wrong.

There is a special use for ellipsis in film, as well, especially in scripts. The ellipsis is sometimes used to give the actor time for gestures and acting out the scenes. More often, the ellipses are used in between sections of the narrative, with the idea of omitting those sections that are not absolutely important to the story. This cutting off by using ellipses is sometimes called a match cut, as this is important in avoiding excess, yet necessary when the actors may need to have the cut-out part in mind while acting. This practice agrees more with the origin of the word, which is elleipsis in Latin, meaning to leave out.

There is another use for ellipsis in law, in legal documents, but instead of three dots, the ellipsis takes the form of four dots at the end of a sentence.
Copied from www.kentlaw.edu:
“When placing an ellipsis at the end of a quotation to indicate the omission of material, use four points -- a three-point ellipsis and a period. The ellipsis should follow a blank space.”
Their example:
“The First Amendment provides that "Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech . . . ." U.S. Const. amend.”