Writing a personal letter
Using open punctuation
Open punctuation is usually used now for letters. This means
that, apart from the main body of the letter, punctuation is
kept to a minimum. There areno commasafter lines of the
address andno full stopsafter abbreviations. Your address
should be placed at the top right-hand corner of the page.
Each line of the address should be aligned. Don’t slope
them. The date is set underneath it with a line space above it.
Use only the figure of the date:
24 May 200X
not
24th May 200XLeave a line under the date and on the left-hand side of the
page against an imaginary margin start your letter:
Dear Mary
There is no need for a comma after ‘Mary’. If the letter is
handwritten, indent your paragraphs starting with the first
one under ‘Dear Mary’ which isnotindented.
Your ending is up to you. The semi-formal ending is ‘Yours
sincerely’ which is usually centred underneath the completed
letter. You can also use ‘With kind regards’, ‘With best
wishes’ or even ‘With love’. Sign your name directly under-
neath the ending. See Figure 15 for an example of a
handwritten personal letter.
WRITING LETTERS / 135