How to center text in book pages when using left aligned body text

[Silfver]

I want to place text centered in book pages, but still want to have the
bodytext left aligned in the middle of the pages.

Not centered row by row. Rather centered vers by vers; text by text; poem by
poem...

It is for layout of poem texts with varying row-lengths of the verses

/Silfver

 

[Jean-Guy Marcil]

I want to place text centered in book pages, but still want to have the
bodytext left aligned in the middle of the pages.

Not centered row by row. Rather centered vers by vers; text by text; poem by
poem...

It is for layout of poem texts with varying row-lengths of the verses

I think you better post a sample of what you want... I am having some
difficulties undesrtanding what left-aligned-centered text is like.

If you mean that you want each verse left aligned, but with an indent to
give the illusion that it is centered based on the average length of the
lines in the verse, then you need to manually apply a left indent to each
verse, there is no way to automatically achieve that. I guess you could
center-align the whole verse, note down the space between the margin and the
position of the first character of the longest line in the verse. Remove the
center alignement and apply a left indent equal to the space you just noted
down.

 

[Jay Freedman]

I think you better post a sample of what you want... I am having some
difficulties undesrtanding what left-aligned-centered text is like.

If you mean that you want each verse left aligned, but with an indent
to give the illusion that it is centered based on the average length
of the lines in the verse, then you need to manually apply a left
indent to each verse, there is no way to automatically achieve that.
I guess you could center-align the whole verse, note down the space
between the margin and the position of the first character of the
longest line in the verse. Remove the center alignement and apply a
left indent equal to the space you just noted down.

Another possibility is to place each verse in a one-cell table. The
paragraph alignment of the text inside the cell should be Left. Click Table

AutoFit > AutoFit To Contents. Then click Table > Table Properties >

Center. If you don't want the table's borders to be visible/printable, press
Ctrl+Alt+U.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

As Jean-Guy says, there's no way to do this other than pretty much manually
and individually. You can define a Poetry style that has an indent that will
work for lines of an average length, but you'll still have to adjust it for
each poem (most easily done by dragging the indent marker on the ruler). To
facilitate this, make sure to use a line break at the end of each verse,
with paragraph breaks only between stanzas. This keeps each stanza in a
single paragraph, making indent formatting easier and also allowing you to
use Space Before/After to insert extra space between stanzas.

And congratulations on doing this correctly. I'm so tired of seeing poetry
centered on the page using Center alignment, which makes for very difficult
reading.

 

[Jean-Guy Marcil]

Another possibility is to place each verse in a one-cell table. The
paragraph alignment of the text inside the cell should be Left. Click Table
Center. If you don't want the table's borders to be visible/printable, press
Ctrl+Alt+U.

Oh yes, good one, with each verse in a one-cell table, it will be easier.
Good idea!

 

[PamC via OfficeKB.com]

What you can do is indent the same amount, say, 1 inch, from the left and
right margins. But if each poem must be centered exactly, this may take a
little case by case guess work. In that case, you can put each poem into an
appropriately sized table (without gridlines), and center the table.

PamC

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

What a clever idea!

 

[Silfver]

Thanks all,

I am not the author/poet, I just help him with Word things.The reason why we
wanted to place texts/verses in the horisontal middle of book pages, but
still with left aligned verses, I think came from uncertainty how a
print-on-demand-platform could handle asymmetrical left and right pages. If
we placed the texts/verses in the middle, left and right pages could have
equal layout...

By Your answers I now know there is no more or less automatic method or
workaround to center the texts the way I asked for.

The idea to use table as a layout tool is good. But in this case I hesitate
a little. There is 110 texts/poems... There will be a lot of table cells to
manage manually in the book... But the trick is good, I sometimes use it to
place a little table of 5-6 columns in the footer in for instance an invoice
template. With places for: addresses; phone nr; e-mail address; company info;
and others... Mostly with no table border lines. Just as a layout tool.

When I had sent the question yesterday I biked downtown and visited the
library. There I saw it is OK to layout poetry books with left aligned texts
at the left page margin in both left and rigth pages. I don't know if there
are different standards in Swedish and other countries way of layout poetry
books. But I know that the poet who wrote all 110 poems like a litte more
classical style...

Maybe I can convince him to use a layout that is easy to handle. Easier for
me to manage in Word with not to much manually and individual adjusting and
settings...(110 poems...!)

There is nevertheless a lot of things to alter: To put styles instead of all
local formatting in the texts for instance...

When I came back from the short bike ride there were already 6 good and
engaged answers to my question. Cool...

Thank You all...

/Silfver

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

If you're just concerned about whether print-on-demand can handle "Mirror
margins" or a gutter, I think you should at least inquire, but I should
think surely it could (especially if it can handle things like headers and
footers, esp. "Different odd and even").

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Thanks all,

I am not the author/poet, I just help him with Word things.The reason why
we
wanted to place texts/verses in the horisontal middle of book pages, but
still with left aligned verses, I think came from uncertainty how a
print-on-demand-platform could handle asymmetrical left and right pages.
If
we placed the texts/verses in the middle, left and right pages could have
equal layout...

By Your answers I now know there is no more or less automatic method or
workaround to center the texts the way I asked for.

The idea to use table as a layout tool is good. But in this case I
hesitate
a little. There is 110 texts/poems... There will be a lot of table cells
to
manage manually in the book... But the trick is good, I sometimes use it
to
place a little table of 5-6 columns in the footer in for instance an
invoice
template. With places for: addresses; phone nr; e-mail address; company
info;
and others... Mostly with no table border lines. Just as a layout tool.

When I had sent the question yesterday I biked downtown and visited the
library. There I saw it is OK to layout poetry books with left aligned
texts
at the left page margin in both left and rigth pages. I don't know if
there
are different standards in Swedish and other countries way of layout
poetry
books. But I know that the poet who wrote all 110 poems like a litte more
classical style...

Maybe I can convince him to use a layout that is easy to handle. Easier
for
me to manage in Word with not to much manually and individual adjusting
and
settings...(110 poems...!)

There is nevertheless a lot of things to alter: To put styles instead of
all
local formatting in the texts for instance...

When I came back from the short bike ride there were already 6 good and
engaged answers to my question. Cool...

Thank You all...

/Silfver

 

[Silfver]

I think the author/poet (friend of a friend) I am helping with some Word
things is some kind of member to a print-on-demand-platform. I have passed
some specific questions to the print-on-demand via him. While waiting on
answers I am testing some layout ideas. To be prepared.

Next thing is to overlook the texts and get them consequent what concerns
paragraph breaks and so on.

Then shift out local/direct formatting to real styles with Find and Replace.
If that is best to do before or after we join all the separate files into one
single I have to test a little before. The print-on-demand say in their FAQ
that they can take a single file in either .doc or PDF format.

To join all the files into a huge single one I have found an add-in/macro
(Boiler) for Word made by Woody Leonhard/Graham Taylor. Have not tried it yet
but think it will do exactly what we need...

/Silfver

 

[Silfver]

Graham Major .. not Taylor. Sorry!

I think the author/poet (friend of a friend) I am helping with some Word
things is some kind of member to a print-on-demand-platform. I have passed
some specific questions to the print-on-demand via him. While waiting on
answers I am testing some layout ideas. To be prepared.

Next thing is to overlook the texts and get them consequent what concerns
paragraph breaks and so on.

Then shift out local/direct formatting to real styles with Find and Replace.
If that is best to do before or after we join all the separate files into one
single I have to test a little before. The print-on-demand say in their FAQ
that they can take a single file in either .doc or PDF format.

To join all the files into a huge single one I have found an add-in/macro
(Boiler) for Word made by Woody Leonhard/Graham Taylor. Have not tried it yet
but think it will do exactly what we need...

/Silfver

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Anything you can do in Word and output to PDF should be perfect. I'd
strongly advise supplying a PDF if you possibly can.

 

[Graham Mayor]

My name is Mayor!
http://www.gmayor.com/downloads.htm

--
<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>><<>
Graham Mayor - Word MVP


<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>><<>

 

[Silfver]

Oh, Sorry again! Must have been tired yesterday...

/Silfver