Integrating Quotations:
Great Expectations style
English 12
Ms. Bilskemper
A quotation is like…
• A helium balloon
– We all know what happens when you let go of a
helium balloon: it flies away. In a way, the same
thing happens when you present a quotation that
is standing all by itself in your writing, a quotation
that is not "held down" by one of your own
sentences. The quotation will seem disconnected
from your own thoughts and from the flow of your
sentences.
The Wrong Way…
• Estella is very adamant that she has not and
cannot possibly love someone else. “’I have
not bestowed my tenderness anywhere. I
have never had any such thing’” (Dickens
254).
- your quotation is not attached to anything
and no connection is made for the reader.
Many Right Ways…
• At the beginning of your own sentence
• “[T]he dark flat wilderness beyond the
churchyard, intersected with dykes and
mounds and gates, with scattered cattle
feeding on it” is where the novel starts out,
setting the overall tone of ominous mystery
within the first few paragraphs of the novel
(Dickens 1-2).
In the middle of your own sentence
• Estella’s cold side was further revealed when
she, after scoffing at Pip, looked at him “as
insolently as if [he] were a dog in disgrace” as
she placed his meal on the ground (Dickens
48).
At the end of your own sentence
• Dickens hints at Mr. Jaggers’ true uncaring
nature when he interacts with a client,
eventually throwing “his supplicant off with
supreme indifference, and [leaving] him
dancing on the pavement as if it were redhot” (Dickens 130).
Divided by your own words
• “There was a gay fiction among us that we
were constantly enjoying ourselves, and a
skeleton truth that we never did,” asserts Pip
as he reminisces about the prestigious and
elite Grove of the Finches, continuing, “To the
best of my belief, our case was in the last
aspect a rather common one” (Dickens 333).
Introducing a quotation with a colon
• Estella is very adamant that she has not and
cannot possibly love someone else: “’I have
not bestowed my tenderness anywhere. I
have never had any such thing’” (Dickens
254).
Introducing a quotation with a comma
• Finally realizing his intended great
expectations do not match up with his
aspirations of being with Estella, Pip states,
“Miss Havisham’s intentions towards me, all a
mere dream; Estella not designed for me; I
only suffered in Satis House as a convenience,
a sting for the greedy relations, a model with a
mechanical heart to practice on when no
other practice was at hand; those were the
first smarts I had” (Dickens 361).
Introducing a quotation using “that”
• With the re-introduction to the convict, now
known as Magwitch, Pip fully realizes that
“Miss Havisham’s intentions towards me, all a
mere dream; Estella not designed for me; I
only suffered in Satis House as a convenience,
a sting for the greedy relations, a model with a
mechanical heart to practice on when no
other practice was at hand” (Dickens 361).
Simple Punctuation Rules
• There are only two punctuation marks to
introduce a quotations
– A comma (,) following verbs (states, says, yells,
commands, etc)
– A colon (:) following complete sentences
• NO PUNCTUATION FOLLOWS ‘THAT’!
The big quotations…
• If your quotation takes up more than four full
lines, you need to use block quotations.
– Introduce it with a complete sentence and a colon
(:)
– tab indent, single spaced.
– Punctuation should be exact. The parenthetical
citation (Dickens #) stands alone next to it.
Block Quotation example
After one simple interaction with someone of a
different social class, Pip begins a downward spiral into selfdeprecating thoughts:
So, leaving word with the shopman on what day I was
wanted at Miss Havisham’s again, I set off on the fourmile walk to our forge; pondering, as I went along, on
all I had seen, and deeply revolving that I was a
common laboring-boy; that my hands were coarse;
that my boots were thick; that I had fallen into a
despicable habit of calling knaves Jacks; that I was
much more ignorant than I had considered myself last
night, and generally that I was in a low-lived bad way.
(Dickens 429)