Colon followed by capital letter

[jack]

The traditional English grammar rule is that a colon introduces a phrase (?) which may or may not would a grammatical sentence on its own, but is considered part of the same sentence as before the colon[1].

However, if the part after the colon could be a full sentence, every so often it seems more natural to treat it as if it was, with an initial capital letter. And I'm sure I've seen this every so often. I've not quite identified what the circumstances are when I prefer this, just that sometimes that's what my instinct is.

My question is, is this still non-standard? And do you think there's any benefit in using it?

[1] Or a list.

Comments

[pseudomonas]

Could you give some examples?

[jack]

Well, I always find it hard to bring examples to mind. But from my last post, "I think an important lesson is: If you're trying to sell something, TELL PEOPLE WHAT IT IS!"

I suspect that the sentence will always make sense if you use a lowercase after the colon, but here an uppercase felt mor natural.

I think I want to do it when the post-colon sentence can stand alone. So if it's only meaningful with the pre-colon introduction ("And the lesson is: try" or "You should never do what Harry did: run with scissors and trip up") then it has to stay lowercase.

[pseudomonas]

Your post-colon bit is implicitly quoted, no?

[jack]

Hm. Perhaps. But I'm not sure what would differentiate a post-colon phrase that should be in quotes from one that shouldn't?

[sunflowerinrain]

I find the capital uncomfortable: in this example the colon is a substitution for "that" or even "this: that" or "this, that", so the expansion would be "And the lesson is that You should never do what Harry did: run with scissors and trip up."

"I think an important lesson is that If you're trying to sell something, TELL PEOPLE WHAT IT IS!"

um.

[corrvin]

If what goes after the colon is an independent clause, you should capitalize the first letter, just as you would if you were transcribing dialogue (which also contains independent clauses as parts of a larger sentence): He said, "Don't you like puppies?"

That doesn't mean that the independent clause after the colon can't fulfill a role in the whole sentence.

[jack]

Oh, hm. I should have simply checked wikipedia first: it asserts that that (which is about what I've started doing) is standard American usage, but not British.