Quote:
Originally Posted by ApK
[...]* As claimed here:
http://www.scribophile.com/academy/c...ion-mark-usage
p.s. Just flipped through some "search inside" pages on amazon.co.uk.
I checked Jane Austen, J.K. Rowling and whomever was on the current bestseller list, and while some use single quotes around dialog and others used double, they all put the comma INSIDE the quotes. |
As far as I know, the double-quotes versus single-quotes choices is part of the book production - like choosing the font style and size - rather than a regional thing. I've got plenty of examples from books (U.S. and U.K) going back many years. A casual scan through them suggests both quote types have been used in both regions, with perhaps a greater tendency to single-quotes in recent times (but that's not exactly a comprehensive study).
A quote from Bulldog Drummond by Sapper, published by Hodder & Stoughton Limited, London. This is the sixty-fifth edition from 1943:
Quote:
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"Really," remarked Drummond, "I think, sir, that you must be right in your diagnosis of your chauffeur's mentality."
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Notice the double quotes and the comma inside the quotes. If you take a look at the University of Oxford guide linked to from Karen Garvin's article, you will see how she has managed to get confused. The Oxford guide does suggest single quotes for outer speech*, but when talking about commas inside or outside the quotes it distinguishes between whether the comma belongs as part of the direct speech or not (and they manage to avoid contradicting themselves by not showing an example for the simplest case: "Hello," he said.) Aside from the simple case, it is uncommon to break speech away from where a comma might legitimately appear, and so their exceptional situation is rare (and, as far as I can tell, largely ignored in commercially published novels).
* Note that some care has to be exercised when dealing with style-guides. Many, such as University ones, are about internal preferences rather than necessarily expressing a wider definition. Some do get adopted more widely, but you need to look more widely to find and verify that - and in the case of single vs double quotes I can see no reason to support a regional bias.
Disclaimer: I don't really have the qualifications back my remarks above - other than observation of the books on my shelves.