Dialogue and
Quotation Marks
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Direct Quotations:
 Ex: The monster said,
Use quotes to surround
“Why am I so ugly?”
the information that is
to be directly cited, this
 Ex: “Because,” the
includes what a person
doctor replied, “you
says.
are a wretched
monster.”
If you introduce a
speaker, separate it with Notice that there are
commas around both
a comma.
sides of the doctor replied
Capitalize the first letter because the sentence
in the quote if it is the
being quoted is
beginning of a sentence. continued.
Ex: “No,” it said. “I
am not wretched!”
--In this case, No is an
interjection and
should be ended with
a punctuation mark,
but the comma is
used, and the
punctuation moved to
after the explanatory
remark.
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What is wrong with
this example:
He said “I don’t
want to hear you
whine about how
you don’t want to
be wretched”!
Always place commas and periods inside
quotation marks.
 Colons and semicolons belong outside
quotation marks.
 Place an exclamation mark or a question
mark inside the quotation marks if it is a
part of the quote;
 if it is a part of the sentence (not the
quote), put it outside the quotation marks;
 if both, use only one inside the quotes.

Ex: He said, “I think so”;
however, I’m not sure if he was
or not.
--Note the semicolon outside the
quote.

Ex: Did he say, “I don’t know”?
--“I don’t know” is not a question, so the question
mark goes outside.
 Ex: Did he ask, “What do you think?”
--Notice that both the quote and the sentence are
questions with one interior question mark.
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Use single
quotation marks
around quotes
within a quote.

Ex: The teacher told us,
“My mom always said,
‘Play with bulls, get
gored.’”
Ex: He said, “I think
he told me to ‘Go
 Ex: She said, “I heard
jump in a lake.’”
Billy say, ‘Gert said,
“She’s smelly.”’”
Woah!
That
makes my
head spin!
P-P-Paragraphing!
 When
writing dialogue, start a new
paragraph and a new set of
quotations whenever the speaker
changes.
Tip: You don’t always need to write
“he said..” or “Billy said….”
Sometimes it is implied and can be
easily figured out by the reader.
That helps when the “he said” thing
becomes monotonous.
This excerpt is taken from Ender’s Game by
Orson Scott Card
 If
a speaker talks over
multiple paragraphs,
leave the end of the
paragraph open (no
quote mark), but put a
quote mark in at the
beginning of the next
paragraph of dialogue.
This excerpt is taken
from Ender’s Game by
Orson Scott Card
•Put unknown or unusual slang or expressions in
quotes. Put directly stated definitions in quotes.
•Ex: I yelled at my sister for saying “cut the
cheese”; it’s slang that means “flatulence.”
MLA and Citation
You can mold your quote into part of your
sentence; don’t use commas.
Ex: According to Doc, everyone must “watch that
lovable cat and delightful mouse” on Feb 2 (45).
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Remember MLA citation:
end quote
 open parentheses
 author name
 page number
 End parentheses
 period
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Examples of MLA:
 Harold Bloomfeld writes, “It’s a matter of
semantics” (73).

It was on a rainy day that “the world learned of
the tragedy that befell young Djiboutians”
(Marsden 67).

John Farquhar is an expert in tree fungus and
claims that there are more than “forty-thousand
types of tree fungus, two-hundred of which
emanate a phosphorescent glow” (383).
Vernacular

Be very careful of
writing in the
vernacular, or a
character’s dialect.
Mark Twain was
great at it, but it is
very difficult to do.
“Ayuh, I guess that I’d
be a goo-in out ta da
bahn wheya I’d be a
findin’t dat deya ol’
heiffah. She’s a
wicked gawgiss ol’
buh-id, tain’t she?”
Put quotes around:
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titles of short stories
short poems
short songs
newspaper/magazine articles
book chapters
single episode titles of TV shows.
Underline or italicize titles for…
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books
long poems
plays, films
TV series
paintings
long songs
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name of ships, planes,
spacecraft
newspapers and
magazine names
court cases
Also italicize anything
in a foreign language
or a direct reference
to a word.