Poetry problem again?!

[rewyn]

Well here is my new dilemma with poetry...

I have a chapter which has a centered, italic epigraph at the top of the main page; however, that epigraph also has a poem written in stanza form in it.

Is there a way to wrap the stanza that it retains the align left, but is also centered within the rest of the epigraph?

Been trying this:

<div class="epicenter">
<p class="verse">"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,</p>

<p class="verse2">because he has anointed me</p>

<p class="verse3">to bring good news to the poor.</p>
</div>

div.epicenter {
clear: both;
float: center;
font-style : italic;
margin-top: 1em;
line-height: 1.2em;
display: inline-block;
}

So far I'm stuck. Anyone have a clue how I can do this, or if I simply cannot let me know also.

[theducks]

float: center ???? right or left or none

text-align: center

[RbnJrg]

Yes, there are several ways to do what you want. One aproximation could be:

1. In the .css stylesheet:

p {
   font-size: 1em;
   text-indent: 1.2em;
   text-align: justify;
}

div.epigraph {
   text-indent: 0;
   text-align: center;
   font-style: italic;
   font-weight: bold;
   font-size: 1.1em;
}

div.epigraph div.stanza {
   width: 60%;  /* You can play here with the width */
   margin: 1em 20%; /* Left and right margins are linked with the width you set */
   padding: 0.5em; /* This is not necessary, only if you want a border around the stanza */
   text-indent: 0;
   text-align: left;
   font-size: 0.8em;
   font-weight: normal;
   border: 1px solid; /* This is not necessary */
} 

div.stanza p {
   margin: 0;
}

2. In your .xhtml file:

<div class="epigraph">
    This is the title
    <div class="stanza">
       <p>"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,</p>
       <p>because he has anointed me</p>
       <p>to bring good news to the poor.</p>
    </div>
</div>

<p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Nulla ac tellus nunc. Phasellus imperdiet leo metus, et gravida lacus. Donec metus ligula, elementum at pellentesque pellentesque, suscipit ac nunc. Etiam lobortis, massa ac aliquam auctor, augue nisl sagittis urna, at dapibus tellus erat ullamcorper ligula.</p>

This is how it looks in Sigil:



Below you can check the respective epub.

Regards
Rubén

[rubeus]

Has nothing to with Sigil. This is a plain epub(xhtm/css question. Damn, why are those questions always put into this forum and in addition not moved by moderators?

[theducks]

Moderator Notice
moved out of Sigil. This issue is not caused BY Sigil

[Turtle91]

One thing to watch out for is the length of your stanza lines. If they are too long for the display widh you will get word-wrapping that makes the lines look funny:

eg:

There once was a man from
Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a
bucket.
But his daughter, named
Nan,
Ran away with a man
And as for the bucket,
Nantucket.


Cheers,

[RbnJrg]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

One thing to watch out for is the length of your stanza lines. If they are too long for the display widh you will get word-wrapping that makes the lines look funny:

eg:

There once was a man from
Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a
bucket.
But his daughter, named
Nan,
Ran away with a man
And as for the bucket,
Nantucket.


Cheers,

Yes, you are right; for that reason I said the OP must "play" with the width of the div "stanza". But if the stanza lines are still too long, the OP should adjust the "div.stanza p" style with a negative indent and a positive left margin so the stanza lines look like:

    There once was a man from 
        Nantucket
    Who kept all his cash in a 
        bucket.
    But his daughter, named 
        Nan,
    Ran away with a man
    And as for the bucket, 
        Nantucket.

Regards

[HarryT]

Is there any way to reproduce the layout usually used in printed poetry, which is to align wrapping lines with the end of the initial line? I can't think of a way to reproduce that in an ePub (other than to use a fixed page layout, of course).

[Jellby]

Not that I know. I asked for this a long time ago (almost 6 years): http://www.daisy.org/epub/?q=issues/...-option-poetry

[HarryT]

Yes, because it's not even right-justification in the usual sense of the word. The wrapped line is right justified with respect to the end of the left-justified initial line, not with respect to the right margin.

[RbnJrg]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Is there any way to reproduce the layout usually used in printed poetry, which is to align wrapping lines with the end of the initial line? I can't think of a way to reproduce that in an ePub (other than to use a fixed page layout, of course).

Hi Harry;

With css2, you can't get what you want. But with css3 and epub3 (supported by the new ADE 4.x), yes, you can There is a new property called "text-align-last" that allow us to align the last line of a text block. Of that way, if you use, for example the following style for stanzas:

.stanza {
     text-align: left; /* or text-align: justify; */
     text-align-last: right;
}

you'll have what you were looking for.

Regards
Rubén

[Jellby]

It wouldn't work for more than two lines (what would be the desired behaviour here?), and according to http://www.w3schools.com/cssref/css3...align-last.asp "text-align-last" only works with "text-align: justify", although firefox doesn't seem to care. In addition, the last line is aligned with the "container", not with the actual previous line.

Nevertheless, it's better than nothing. Still no way to add the bracket before the last line, I guess.

[Turtle91]

Originally Posted by Jellby

It wouldn't work for more than two lines (what would be the desired behaviour here?), and according to http://www.w3schools.com/cssref/css3...align-last.asp "text-align-last" only works with "text-align: justify", although firefox doesn't seem to care. In addition, the last line is aligned with the "container", not with the actual previous line.

Not only is the last line aligned with the container, but any line that is only 1 line long...by definition that is the last line, so it would be aligned to the right.

Originally Posted by Jellby

Nevertheless, it's better than nothing.

Slowly getting there....

[RbnJrg]

Originally Posted by Jellby

It wouldn't work for more than two lines (what would be the desired behaviour here?)

Hi Jellby;

w3schools.com gives an example with more than two lines:

http://www.w3schools.com/cssref/tryi...ext-align-last

And you're right; in theory, "text-align" should be "justify" in order that "text-align-last" works. But as you say, it also works with "text-align: left", at least on Firefox.

Nevertheless, it's better than nothing. Still no way to add the bracket before the last line, I guess.

Yes, that's a pending task. Maybe with a script in epub3 could be done but really I don't know.

Regards

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Not only is the last line aligned with the container, but any line that is only 1 line long...by definition that is the last line, so it would be aligned to the right.

Gee, you are right. That makes it unusable, I'm afraid