07-28-2014, 10:20 AM | #31 | |
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07-28-2014, 11:01 AM | #32 |
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I find this thread baffling. Has the OP never read dialog in books before?
It's one thing to wonder if you should use UK or US standards in an international market, but where on Earth did the idea for those wacky non-standard punctuation schemes come from?? Do this, if you've somehow managed to avoid doing it so far in your literary life: Go to Amazon.com or some B&M book store and look for best sellers in the country or language that concerns you. Open some up and note how dialog is punctuated. Look at, say 10 books. If you happen to come across one of the ten that is punctuated differently than the other nine, toss it and go with the majority. By the way, I would find the period in the quotes before the tag jarring. Can some one point me to a mainstream US book where dialog is handled that way? That is, I'm used to "Yes," he said. rather than "Yes." he said. I don't know why this is so for a period, since question marks and exclamation points always go in the quotes, but it is. Can't recall ever having seen the second way in a BPH US book. ApK Last edited by ApK; 07-28-2014 at 11:28 AM. |
07-28-2014, 12:48 PM | #33 | |
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07-28-2014, 12:49 PM | #34 |
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That UK style comma, outside the quote mark, makes me squirm and twitch.
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07-28-2014, 09:05 PM | #35 |
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07-28-2014, 10:13 PM | #36 |
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07-29-2014, 12:47 AM | #37 |
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On the OP, I think the right way to look at it is like this:
"I don't use single quotes." That's a sentence. "I don't use single quotes," he said. That is a single sentence, not two. If you treated the sentence within the quotes as a complete sentence in example 2, you would have to go like this: "I don't use single quotes." He said. Which is seriously nonstandard. The quotes are there to distinguish speech, that is all. If you used a more European convention, e.g. the dash, to serve the same function, you get (and I don't know how to insert an em-dash): --I don't use single quotes, he said. Which is quite obviously a single sentence. All you have to do is keep it clear and unambiguous. The normal typographical convention is the comma within the closing quote. Best to stick to it. On double v single quotes, I rummaged up the oldest UK printed hardbacks I could find easily in my, er, Library. Ten Trails to Tyburn, by Bruce Graeme, published by Hutchinson during WW2 (Book Production Economy War Standard): double quotes. Master of Ballantrae, R L Stevenson, Collins' Clear Type press, undated, but from typographical and other considerations certainly around 1900, also double quotes. And, just to make life more fun, the double quote with a space: " I think you are a devil of a son to me, " cried his father... instead of "I think you are a devil of a son to me," cried his father... There's also a curious inconsistency in-house. Penguin Books' first P G Wodehouse paperback, My man Jeeves, has, in its 1936 reprint double quotes (with space!). But in a late 50s Wodehouse Penguin, not the same title, I find single quotes (without space). Last edited by Pulpmeister; 07-29-2014 at 12:50 AM. Reason: typo |
07-29-2014, 01:02 AM | #38 | |||||
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I've also checked my Oxford Style Manual, and that one has actual example sentences of the comma going outside the quotes. It seems to depend on the sentence itself, for example: Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
In UK practice, as far as I can tell, comma-outside-the-quotation-marks for direct speech, regardless of the internal punctuation of the phrase/sentence, is indeed not actually done in literature/fiction/novels. At least I can't recall ever seeing it in a UK non-academic book. I assume that in direct speech, the comma in practice still goes inside the quotation marks in fiction books for the sake of consistency, while in academic texts it's more important to adhere to the punctuation of the original sentence and make clear whether a comma was part of the original phrase/sentence or not. In other words, if in doubt, regardless of whether one uses UK or US English, I'd say "in direct speech, always put the comma inside the quotation marks, followed by the interpolation starting with a non-capital letter". And not that anyone here asked about question marks or exclamation marks, but just to make sure anyone viewing the topic won't be left in doubt... Quote:
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07-29-2014, 01:04 AM | #39 | |
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Ah, those extra spaces in older books! I'm sure if you take a closer look at your book you will find that they are narrower than regular spaces and also to be found before colons, semicolons, exclamation marks and question marks. They used to be the norm (and I think they still are in French). I like them. |
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08-09-2014, 02:19 PM | #40 | |
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08-15-2014, 12:28 AM | #41 |
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Thanks issybird. I felt like I was in "The Twilight Zone" reading this thread until I got to this.
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08-15-2014, 09:51 AM | #42 |
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