Encode Speeches in Semi-Diplomatic Transcriptions

Rationale

LEMDO wants to faithfully capture text in source playbooks. For that reason, we wrap the <sp> element around single speeches as they are composed in the source books. We do not supply who delivers a speech—it is the editor’s job to assign this in the modernized text only.

Practice: Encode Speeches

To encode speeches, follow these steps:
Wrap the speech, including the speech prefix, in the <sp> element.
Wrap the speech prefix (if present in your source playbook) in the <speaker> element. Do not add a <speaker> element if there is not a speech prefix present in your source playbook.
Wrap the speech in the <ab> (anonymous block) element.
Use the milestone <lb> element to demarcate the beginning of a compositorial line. When the compositorial line begins with the speech prefix, put the <lb> element before the <sp> element.
Note that we do not use the @who attribute in semi-diplomatic transcriptions.
For example:
<lb/> <sp>
  <speaker>Duke</speaker>
  <ab>Kinsmen and friends, take from your manly sides <lb/>Your weapons to keepe backe the desprate boy <lb/>From doing violence to the innocent dead.</ab>
</sp>

Practice: Number Speeches

LEMDO has an XSLT to programmatically number the speeches in your semi-diplomatic transcription. This transformation makes it quick and simple to give consecutively numbered xml:ids to the <sp> elements in your file.
Running the XSLT to number your speeches should be one of the last steps that you undertake when encoding your semi-diplomatic transcription, followed only by running the XSLT to number lines. This is because speeches are often revised during the encoding process and you cannot simply undo the numbering transformation. If you do need to renumber speeches after running the XSLT, you can remove the speech numbering using a regular expression.
To run the XSLT to number speeches, follow the instructions outlined in Transformations. You will use the transformation called LEMDO: Add ids to speeches in semi-dip texts.

Special Case: Speeches Split Across a Page or Column Break

You will find cases when speeches continue onto the following page or into the right column of a page with text columns. When this occurs, encode the speech as one speech and include any formwork information (catchword, signature number, running title, facsimile link, figure descriptions, page number, etc.). Do not create a new speech on the following page or column. When a split speech occurs in your text, follow this practice:
Wrap the entire speech in a single <sp> element (as usual).
Wrap the speech prefix in a <speaker> element.
Wrap the entire speech in a single <ab> element as usual.
Where there is a page beginning, put a milestone <pb> element. Encode all forme works.
Where there is a column beginning, put a mileston <cb> element.
An example from a folio play when the speech continues from the left column into the right column:
<lb type="wln"/> <sp>
  <speaker>Vint.</speaker>
  <ab> What, stand’st thou still, and hear’st such a cal<pc force="weak">-</pc>
    <cb n="2"/>
    <lb type="wln"/>ling? Looke to the Guests within: My Lord, olde Sir <lb type="wln"/>
    <hi rendition="rnd:italic">Iohn</hi> with halfe a dozen more, are at the doore: shall I let <lb type="wln"/>them in? </ab>
</sp>
An example from a quarto play when the speech continues onto the next page:
<lb type="wln"/> <sp>
  <speaker>Bungay.</speaker>
  <ab> What meanes the frier that frolickt it of late, <lb type="wln"/>To sit as melancholie in his cell: <fw type="catch">A</fw>
    <pb n="H1r"/>
    <fw type="runningTitle">The honourable historie of Frier Bacon.</fw>
    <lb type="wln"/>To sit as melancholie in his cell, <lb type="wln"/>As if he had neither lost nor wonne to day. </ab>
</sp>

Special Case: Floating Speeches

You may come across a speech that spans multiple lines floating within the compositorial block beside other speeches or stage directions in your source playbook. If you come across this scenario, you will put the @rendition attribute with the value "rnd:rightAdjacent" on the <sp> element. Do not add an <lb> element before the opening <sp> tag. Do add <lb> elements at the start of each subsequent line within the speech. Do not add the @type or @n attributes on these <lb> elements.
For example:
<sp xml:id="emdHam_Q2_sp5" rendition="rnd:rightAdjacent">
  <speaker>Hamlet</speaker>
  <ab> If <g ref="lig:longS_h">sh</g>e <g ref="lig:longS_h">sh</g>ould <lb/>breake it now. </ab>
</sp>

Prosopography

Isabella Seales

Isabella Seales is a fourth year undergraduate completing her Bachelor of Arts in English at the University of Victoria. She has a special interest in Renaissance and Metaphysical Literature. She is assisting Dr. Jenstad with the MoEML Mayoral Shows anthology as part of the Undergraduate Student Research Award program.

Janelle Jenstad

Janelle Jenstad is a Professor of English at the University of Victoria, Director of The Map of Early Modern London, and Director of Linked Early Modern Drama Online. With Jennifer Roberts-Smith and Mark Kaethler, she co-edited Shakespeare’s Language in Digital Media: Old Words, New Tools (Routledge). She has edited John Stow’s A Survey of London (1598 text) for MoEML and is currently editing The Merchant of Venice (with Stephen Wittek) and Heywood’s 2 If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody for DRE. Her articles have appeared in Digital Humanities Quarterly, Elizabethan Theatre, Early Modern Literary Studies, Shakespeare Bulletin, Renaissance and Reformation, and The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies. She contributed chapters to Approaches to Teaching Othello (MLA); Teaching Early Modern Literature from the Archives (MLA); Institutional Culture in Early Modern England (Brill); Shakespeare, Language, and the Stage (Arden); Performing Maternity in Early Modern England (Ashgate); New Directions in the Geohumanities (Routledge); Early Modern Studies and the Digital Turn (Iter); Placing Names: Enriching and Integrating Gazetteers (Indiana); Making Things and Drawing Boundaries (Minnesota); Rethinking Shakespeare Source Study: Audiences, Authors, and Digital Technologies (Routledge); and Civic Performance: Pageantry and Entertainments in Early Modern London (Routledge). For more details, see janellejenstad.com.

Joey Takeda

Joey Takeda is LEMDO’s Consulting Programmer and Designer, a role he assumed in 2020 after three years as the Lead Developer on LEMDO.

Mahayla Galliford

Project manager, 2025-present; research assistant, 2021-present. Mahayla Galliford (she/her) graduated with a BA (Hons with distinction) from the University of Victoria in 2024. Mahayla’s undergraduate research explored early modern stage directions and civic water pageantry. Mahayla continues her studies through UVic’s English MA program and her SSHRC-funded thesis project focuses on editing and encoding girls’ manuscripts, specifically Lady Rachel Fane’s dramatic entertainments, in collaboration with LEMDO.

Martin Holmes

Martin Holmes has worked as a developer in the UVic’s Humanities Computing and Media Centre for over two decades, and has been involved with dozens of Digital Humanities projects. He has served on the TEI Technical Council and as Managing Editor of the Journal of the TEI. He took over from Joey Takeda as lead developer on LEMDO in 2020. He is a collaborator on the SSHRC Partnership Grant led by Janelle Jenstad.

Navarra Houldin

Training and Documentation Lead 2025–present. LEMDO project manager 2022–2025. Textual remediator 2021–present. Navarra Houldin (they/them) completed their BA with a major in history and minor in Spanish at the University of Victoria in 2022. Their primary research was on gender and sexuality in early modern Europe and Latin America. They are continuing their education through an MA program in Gender and Social Justice Studies at the University of Alberta where they will specialize in Digital Humanities.

Tracey El Hajj

Junior Programmer 2019–2020. Research Associate 2020–2021. Tracey received her PhD from the Department of English at the University of Victoria in the field of Science and Technology Studies. Her research focuses on the algorhythmics of networked communications. She was a 2019–2020 President’s Fellow in Research-Enriched Teaching at UVic, where she taught an advanced course on Artificial Intelligence and Everyday Life. Tracey was also a member of the Map of Early Modern London team, between 2018 and 2021. Between 2020 and 2021, she was a fellow in residence at the Praxis Studio for Comparative Media Studies, where she investigated the relationships between artificial intelligence, creativity, health, and justice. As of July 2021, Tracey has moved into the alt-ac world for a term position, while also teaching in the English Department at the University of Victoria.

Orgography

LEMDO Team (LEMD1)

The LEMDO Team is based at the University of Victoria and normally comprises the project director, the lead developer, project manager, junior developers(s), remediators, encoders, and remediating editors.

Metadata

Authority title Encode Speeches in Semi-Diplomatic Transcriptions
Type of text Documentation
Publisher University of Victoria on the Linked Early Modern Drama Online Platform
Series Linked Early Modern Drama Online
Source
TEI Customization created by Martin Holmes, Joey Takeda, and Janelle Jenstad; documentation written by members of the LEMDO Team
Editorial declaration n/a
Edition Released with Linked Early Modern Drama Online 1.0
Encoding description Encoded in TEI P5 according to the LEMDO Customization and Encoding Guidelines
Document status prgGenerated
Funder(s) Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
License/availability
This file is licensed under a CC BY-NC_ND 4.0 license, which means that it is freely downloadable without permission under the following conditions: (1) credit must be given to the author and LEMDO in any subsequent use of the files and/or data; (2) the content cannot be adapted or repurposed (except in quotations for the purposes of academic review and citation); and (3) commercial uses are not permitted without the knowledge and consent of the editor and LEMDO. This license allows for pedagogical use of the documentation in the classroom.