You can think of this as a “wait for it” ellipse.
It’s different from the drum roll as it appears in the middle of a sentence, like in the following headline from The Times (UK).
“I went to the most romantic place in the world… wait for it… with my mum”
Gary Halbert likes this version of the ellipse, too. Here’s an example from The Boron Letters: “The first day I went to conquer the hill, I made a whopping 1/8th of a mile before collapsing in defeat. I decided to try again the next day, only this time… I vowed to get off and walk if I had to.”
And MK Fisher in “’’Consider the Oyster: “And there is an equally astounding number of men, and some of them have actually graduated from Yale, and even Princeton, who know positively that oysters are an aphrodisiac … one of the best.”
Isn’t the ellipse a fun and easy technique to use?
How to use an ellipse
In one of his newsletters, Gary Halbert suggests using an ellipse to break up long sentences.
But that feels like lazy writing to me. And it also risks overuse. There’s a risk of irritating your learner.
In this article you are reading now, I’ve used far more ellipses than I would normally do.
So…
Save the dots for their proper purposes:
- To promise there’s more to come (ta da…, the drum roll)
- To add a conversational pause (uh… you know)
- To create suspense in the middle of a sentence (wait for it…)
What punctuation mark is best for a pause?
Each of these punctuation marks creates a pause:
- Ellipsis:…
- Em dash: –
- Parenthesis: ( )
What’s the difference?
The pause of an ellipsis is softest; the em dash is hardest – it feels more abrupt; the parenthesis comes in between.
Here’s another example from MK Fisher from her book ‘The Gastronomical Me: “She was shadowy… a bad liver probably… but mysterious-looking
If you replace the dots by parenthesis, the pause becomes a little harder and the phrase about the bad liver becomes more like an aside:
“She was shadowy (a bad liver probably) but mysterious looking.
And the em dash makes the pause even harder; it’s also more writerly, less conventional: “She was shadowy – a bad liver probably – but mysterious-looking.
There‘s not really a right or wrong way to choose.
It’s a matter of personal preference: How hard do you want the pause to be? Do you want your tone to be more writerly or conversational? And What looks good to you?
If you’re interested, you can find the Gary Halbert Letters here. Gary Halbert Letters