Quotation Marks

Quotation marks do a number of jobs.

Titles:

The first thing quotation marks do is set off titles of short stories, poems, articles, and other things which are part of a book (but not the whole book), such as chapter titles.

For instance:

"First Confessions," by Frank O'Connor

"Jabberwocky," by Lewis Carroll

"Election Results," an article in a newspaper.

Punctuation which comes at the end of the quoted title should be put just before the closing quotation mark, as above.

In a title, capitalize the first and last words, the first word in a subtitle, and all other words except articles, prepositions, coordinating conjunctions, and the "to" in an infinitive. Examples:

"Another Reason Why I Don't Keep a Gun in the House," by Billy Collins. The article a is not capitalized, the preposition in is not capitalized, and the article the is not capitalized. Everything else is capitalized.

Speech:

Another thing quotation marks do is set off what someone says, if it is exactly what someone has said.

Simple quotations:

"Waiter, there's a weasel in my soup," said Murgatroyd.

In a simple quotation, you put quotation marks before the first word the person says, and after the last word, and if there is ending punctuation you put it inside the quotation marks. A period is replaced with a comma if you are showing who speaks and how with words such as "he said" or "whispered Sandra." A question mark or an exclamation mark stays the same, however.

For example:

"My big toe is three feet long," remarked Brendan.

"Whose lunch has dead frogs in it?" sniffed the teacher.

"Don't touch that watermelon, Mr. Quigley!" the paratrooper barked.

If you start with the speaker, put a comma before the quotation marks and end with a period (or ? or !) inside the quotes.

For example:

The monster explained, "I'll eat your brain."

Mr. Higgins said, "Congratulations!"

Joe whined, "Do I have to eat liver?"

Every time you change speakers, start a new paragraph.

A tricky exception to quoted speech is indirect speech. In indirect speech, you are not giving someone's exact words. You are just describing what they said. Indirect speech does not use quotation marks.

For example:

Joe said he'd meet me next door.

The monster explained that if I didn't do what he said, he'd eat my brain.

The teachers yelled at Wesley loudly.

In these examples, what Joe probably said was "I'll meet you next door." He didn't say, "He'd meet me next door." That doesn't make sense. The monster didn't say, "If I didn't do what he said, he'd eat my brain." The teachers didn't say, "At Wesley loudly." Ask yourself what the person's exact words probably were, and you will know if it is a direct quotation or an indirect one.