On my to-do list was a note to write you a post about the correct use of quotation marks. Then I discovered that Jonathon Owen over at Arrant Pedantry had already done so. His article is useful and thorough, so I’ll send you over there to learn How to Use Quotation Marks. He even has …
Tag: Quotations
How to Use Notes and Bibliographies
The next item on the Nonfiction Editing Checklist has to do with citing your sources: ☐ Footnotes, endnotes, blind notes, and reference lists have been used appropriately and are formatted correctly. The Chicago Manual of Style offers several options for citing your sources. The first of these is the least formal, and the last is …
Take Extra Care with Scripture Citations
Quoting Shakespeare is one thing. It’s easy enough to open a copy of Hamlet to get a citation right. Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.—William Shakespeare. The Tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Denmark. The Harvard Classics 1909–14. Act V, Scene I. Via http://www.bartleby.com/46/2/51.html. But when …
Q&A: Quotations versus Dialogue
Q: I have literally hundreds of quotes in my autobiography, and after reading your post about them, I’m really confused. Most of what I’m writing about is not quoting a known source like Mark Twain. Rather, it’s in the form of he said, “blah, blah, blah” when I’m relating a story or incident. I don’t …
Verify the Sources of Your Quotations
One of the most common problems I see in new writers’ nonfiction manuscripts is quotations that are either inaccurate, insufficiently sourced, or both. ☐You have in your notes, if not in the text, citations and links for your sources. Sites like BrainyQuote, Great-Quotes.com, and even Goodreads, which should know better, propagate quotations without verifying the …
How to format different kinds of quotations
When you’re incorporating quotations in a nonfiction work, there are two ways to do it. Short quotations can be placed inline, in which case you use quotation marks. Longer quotations should be placed in a block format, in which case you don’t need the marks. For example, a short quotation might be something like, “Prose …
When to use single or double quotation marks
Considering that the rules for quotation marks are relatively simple (I mean, compared to something really complicated like the comma), it’s surprising how often we see errors with them. In dialog, stuff that’s said aloud goes in quotation marks. “I can’t believe she said that.” (Stuff that’s not said aloud is sometimes set in italics.) …