Forum How do I...?

Put a character in the second line of a verse

fbrzvnrnd
Hi,
I'd like to know if there is a way to put a character "[" before each line of a <p> except the first one.
This is not related to prince, but to html+css, but I wonder if prince have some way to handle this.
Actually I need fot long verse in poem, where a verse take more than a line for the width of a page. Usually the second line take a [ before, and a indent. I have no problem for indent, but no idea for the "[" character.
I try with :after and :first-line, but I do not find a way.

Thanks in adavnce.

f.
mikeday
This is very difficult, as CSS has no facility for adding text at the beginning of each line. The only solution I can think of is very complicated, and involves floating blocks, absolute positioning, generated content, and using background color to cover unwanted text. See below:
<html>
<head>
<style>
p {
    text-indent: 4em hanging;
    margin-bottom: 0
}

p::first-line { background: white }

p::before {
    float: left;
    text-indent: 0;
    margin-left: 2em;
    margin-right: -4em;
    content: "[\A[\A[\A[\A[\A[\A[\A[\A[";
    white-space: pre
}
</style>
</head>
<body>

<p>
the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to
talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones that
never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous
yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the
middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!"
</p>

<!-- cover any remaining [ from the float -->
<div style="background: white; width: 100%; height: 8em; position: absolute">
</div>

</body>
</html>

I'm rather amazed this example is even possible. :)
fbrzvnrnd
Thank you for the answer! Actually I'm studying your code to understand if it can be used in my xhtml.
Actually I have lirics with many verses, so I had to add a div to delete the [ for each verse...
Thanks again for the suggestion.

f.