Punctuating Dialogue

Quotation Marks for Dialogue “Oh, look, Michael asked Louise to dance,” she said. “He did?” I asked, peering down from the gym balcony. “Uh huh. But I don’t think he really likes her.” She wasn’t making me feel any better. Notice each speaker requires a new paragraph. You don’t always have to indicate who is speaking. A reaction to dialogue also gets a new paragraph.

More Rules A comma precedes each speech heading “Hi,” she said. Unless the dialogue ends with a ? “Huh?” she said. A comma also follows a speech heading She said, “Hi.” Commas and periods go INSIDE the quotations at the end of a quote

Question Marks, Exclamation Marks and Dashes All of these go inside the quotation marks, if they are part of the dialogue: Sally asked, “What’s your name?” “Great kick, Maggie!” yelled the coach. “But I can’t – ” he muttered.

Question Marks, Exclamation Marks and Dashes These marks go outside the quote if they apply to the sentence containing the quote: Why was he asking about “the bearded guy”? I love the lyrics to “Yesterday”! Grandpa’s favorite saying – “hold your horses” – still makes me smile.

Colons and Semicolons These go outside the quotation marks: Next we tried to make “lemon meringue with a soupcon of vanilla”: a total disaster. He interrogated me about “the whereabouts of the colonel”; I was determined to say nothing.

Long Speech If a speaker is delivering a long speech, divided by paragraphs, the quotation marks go only at the beginning of the paragraphs. The quote ends only at the end of the speech: “Good morning. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blahblah blah blah. “I am still speaking blah blah blahblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. “Here is my last paragraph of the speech blah blah blah blah.”

Dialogue containing Quotes If the writer is quoting something that is already in quotation marks, the words go inside both double and single quotation marks: Gatsby thinks he sounds sophisticated when he addresses someone as “ ‘old sport.’” She suggested, “My mother will say, ‘No.’”

No Nos Don’t use quotation marks for emphasis or apology: During the whole exchange with Ophelia, Hamlet was acting “weird.” Don’t use quotation marks for indirect speech: He said that he “wanted to see the film, too.”