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I'm transcribing a manuscript in which there's a very long footnote, spanning across seven 8vo pages, each having a couple lines of main text above the continuing footnote. I estimate it is probably 1400 words / 9000 characters.

Currently, it is typeset starting on a verso page (following two short <10 word footnotes), with the accompanying main text on the recto page. It fills up the verso page entirely, continues to fill about half of the recto page, and then ends with 6 lines on the following verso page. See first verso+recto below.

I would like to preserve it as a footnote to maintain the integrity of the transcription. What are my options?

example

Updated MWE: The problem is related to the inclusion of bigfoot (manyfoot) -- I don't even have to use my "editor's footnote" (\footnoteEd), the footnotes begin on the page before the related main text shows up...

\documentclass[a4paper,12pt,twoside,onecolumn,openright,final]{memoir}

\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{perpage}
\usepackage[ruled]{bigfoot}

\DeclareNewFootnote{default}
\DeclareNewFootnote{Ed}[Alph]
\MakeSortedPerPage{Ed}

\begin{document}

\mainmatter
\lipsum[1-4]

\lipsum[5]\footnote{Short footnote 1}

\lipsum[6]\footnote{Short footnote 2}

\lipsum[7]\footnote{\lipsum[15-32]}

\lipsum[8-14]
\end{document}
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    I would write an endnote for that. Footnote is only the foot of the page, not the whole page.
    – user156344
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 8:03
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    It would be much easier to test answers if you provided a test file that showed the problem (you could keep the file small by using lipsum package to generate filler text.)
    – David Carlisle
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 8:40
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    Added MWE. I know an endnote would be preferable in modern typography, but I have seen 18th and 19th century books with multiple page spanning footnotes and I would like to emulate that for this particular document.
    – meide
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 8:53
  • It’s not quite clear to me what your actual question is: what are you not happy about in the way it currently gets typeset? Do you mean you want to replicate the layout you describe in the original, where instead of ever having a full page containing only footnote, each mostly-footnote page has a few lines of main body text above it?
    – Peter LeFanu Lumsdaine
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 9:05
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    I guess I am wondering about possible footnote layout configurations. Firstly, I want the footnote to begin on the same page as the associated main text. Having a whole page taken up by footnotes that belong to the following page is suboptimal. Secondly, perhaps a way to have it take up at most some percentage of the page, and then continue for however many pages is needed. A 1-to-1 reproduction of the manuscript is not desired (it reserves only 2-3 lines for the main text in the case of long footnotes, but I deem that excessive).
    – meide
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 9:13

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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You may want to replace the instructions

\usepackage{perpage}
\usepackage[ruled]{bigfoot}

with

\usepackage[bottom,splitrule,perpage]{footmisc}

The bottom option tells LaTeX to place the footnote material at the very bottom of the page even if \flushbottom is in effect. The splitrule option tells LaTeX to draw a full-width footnote rule if the footnote material is continued from the preceding page. The perpage option replicates the functionality of the stand-alone perpage package.

Addendum: I'm pretty sure that the footmisc package doesn't coexist peacefully with the bigfoot package. AFAICT, the footmisc and manyfoot packages do manage to coexist.

enter image description here

\documentclass[a4paper,12pt,twoside,onecolumn,openright,final]{memoir}

\usepackage{lipsum}
%\usepackage{perpage}
%\usepackage[ruled]{bigfoot}
\usepackage[bottom,splitrule,perpage]{footmisc}
\usepackage[colorlinks,allcolors=red]{hyperref} % optional

\begin{document}

\mainmatter
\lipsum[1-4]

\lipsum[5]\footnote{Short footnote 1}

\lipsum[6]\footnote{Short footnote 2}

\lipsum[7]\footnote{\lipsum[15-32]}

\lipsum[8-14]
\end{document}
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6
  • 1
    I should mention I also have an "editor's footnote" via manyfoot (it is only used sporadically, not yet sure if needed around these), is this compatible?
    – meide
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 9:32
  • @meide - AFAICT, the footmisc and manyfoot packages manage to coexist. However, depending on how you employ the manyfoot package, some incompatibilities may lurk below the surface. Please provide some information about how you define and use "editor's footnotes".
    – Mico
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 10:43
  • I just use \DeclareNewFootnote{Ed}[Alph] to make a \footnoteEd which are then put below the regular footnotes via the [ruled] option to bigfoot/manyfoot
    – meide
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 11:59
  • Hmm, it is almost there, I think. I now get 2 lines of main text, a huge footnote, then 50/50 main text/footnote, and then the footnote ends on the 3rd page. The main problem is still that the main text to which the footnote refers still comes after the page where the footnote starts...
    – meide
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 14:03
  • @meide - I'm afraid I've lost track of what you're doing. Clearly, the answer I provided is nothing more than starting point. Would you want me to delete my answer as it's evidently of little use?
    – Mico
    Commented Apr 12, 2019 at 14:49

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