Miscellaneous

The drop cap.

Writing Sparkle

The fancy first letter that differs from the rest of the text in a book has always been something I admire while reading a novel. I knew little about it, including what it was called or how it was done.

When I started making formatting decisions for The Funny Side, I wanted to use that fancy first letter for the start of the narrative in each chapter. I learned that it is called a “drop cap.”

In Word, you can create a drop cap by:

  1. Place the cursor on the line you want the drop cap to appear in.
  2. Go to the Insert Tab and select “Drop Cap.”
  3. There are three options: None, Dropped, or In Margin.
  4. Select drop cap options, and you can adjust the font, lines to drop, and distance from the text.
  5. Click “OK” to insert your selection.

Here is an example of each:

Drop Cap ExamplesDownload

2 thoughts on “The drop cap.”

  1. This is cool Shari !

    I prefer the middle example – it just appeals to me more. Can I assume that you adjust the font by selecting it then chose the font as normal?

    I’ve actually used this before (not in my blog posts or pages) but I didnt know what these characters were called but I built them by hand – which takes way too much time to make common use of.

    They add a touch of elegance to our reading pkeasure without blowing the reader out of the story.

    Another great tip !

    Thanks

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Hi, Gary. I like example number two as well, and I used in my formatting for The Funny Side.

      I’m not sure I understand the question, but I will try to answer what I think you are asking. So, you type your document in whatever font you want. When you go to the Insert Tab and select “Drop Cap” it opens a menu with options. In that menu, you select the font style you would like for the fancy letter.

      Like

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