Where they are not proper nouns etc. Especially in Gothic novels, such as The Monk by Matthew Lewis. I can't find anything clear about it on the web. Thanks.
2007-02-21 23:43:14 · 8 answers · asked by the_happy_green_fish 5 in Arts & Humanities ➔ Books & Authors
Rules of grammar and usage have changed over time. Today we accept that capitals are used at the beginning of a sentence and to signify proper nouns. But fairly recently, capitalizing a word within a sentence was a form of emphasis. If you read many classic books and documents, you see it over and over--the Declaration of Independence has a large number of words capitalized to hammer home important themes.
This tradition was replaced by the use of italics as print technology became less expensive. All languages have changing rules of usage. Your teachers may try and tell you that the rules are inflexible and have always been the way they are right now, but in fact languages are changing all the time to meet the needs of the people who speak them. This is part of what keeps a language useful; if a language never changed, it would become useless and obsolete (as Latin did).
2007-02-22 03:22:53 · answer #1 · answered by nbsandiego 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hi it maybe because it's the beginning of a statement.Sometimes during a written conversation between people in the story..instead of writing John said"I am..."they will assume that you know who is speaking and simply begin each reply with a capital letter.They may even be using capital letters as an emphasis on a mood..angry,excited,yelling.
2007-02-22 07:51:55 · answer #2 · answered by jen_n_tn 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
That's the writer's personal style.
2007-02-22 07:49:06 · answer #3 · answered by cuddles_gb 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
There to emphasise that the word/s being used are of some importance.
2007-02-22 07:49:58 · answer #4 · answered by trickyrick32 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It's done for emphasis, the same reason they use italics and rarely underlining.
2007-02-22 07:52:55 · answer #5 · answered by Dan A 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Possibly for emphasis or style.
2007-02-22 07:48:12 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Probably names of people or place names.
2007-02-22 07:46:13 · answer #7 · answered by Rich T 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Are you sure you weren't reading The Gradiun?
2007-02-22 07:51:05 · answer #8 · answered by Reg Tedious 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋