Integrating Quotations into Sentences Don’t Drop the Quote Bomb!

Why do we use direct quotations, anyway? That’s stupid… not a convenient way to summarize plot. not to repeat what you’ve just said an analytical tool to examine and determine significance of language (word choice, tone, implication, subtext, imagery, etc.) to explain what might not be immediately obvious; to dissect “unpack” the quotation to reveal its meaning(s)

Don’t Don’t drop the quote bomb! Don’t just attach a quote to the end of a sentence with a comma (run-on) Don’t refer to the quote as a quote: “This quote shows…” “In this quote…”

Use an introductory phrase (“signal phrase”), but not a complete sentence, separated from the quotation with a comma. Example: Thoreau asks, “Why should we live with such hurry and waste of life?” (47). Example: According to Thoreau, “We do not ride on the railroad; it rides upon us” (42). You should use a comma to separate your own words from the quotation when your introductory or explanatory phrase ends with a verb such as “says,” “thinks,” “believes,” “ponders,” “recalls,” “questions,” and “asks” (and many more). You should also use a comma when you introduce a quotation with a phrase such as “According to Thoreau”.

Make the quotation a part of your own sentence without any punctuation between your own words and the words you are quoting. Example: Thoreau argues that “shams and delusions are esteemed for soundest truths, while reality is fabulous”(48). Example: According to Thoreau, people are too often "thrown off the track by every nutshell and mosquito's wing that falls on the rails” (42). Notice that the word “that” is used in three of the examples above, and when it is used as it is in the examples, “that” replaces the comma which would be necessary without “that” in the sentence. You usually have a choice, then, when you begin a sentence with a phrase such as “Thoreau says.” You either can add a comma after “says” (Thoreau says, “quotation”)  or you can add the word “that” with no comma (Thoreau says that “quotation.”)

Use short quotations as part of your own grammatically-correct sentence. Extract the most important parts of the passage and embed them into your sentence (“E+E”). Break up longer quotations and unpack them piece by piece. Example: In “Where I Lived, and What I Lived For,” Thoreau states that his retreat to the woods around Walden Pond was motivated by his desire “to live deliberately” and to interact with only “the essential facts of life”(36). Example: It is no accident that Twain ends the novel with Huck’s decision to “light out for the territory ahead of the rest,” so that he can avoid being “sivilized” by Aunt Polly. Huck’s final statement—that he has “been there before”—reminds readers of the hypocrisy Huck has found all around him in this so-called “sivilized” society. His only chance of living a carefree, peaceful life, he thinks, is out into the unknown”(324). When you integrate quotations in this way, you do not use any special punctuation. Instead, you should punctuate the sentence just as you would if all of the words were your own.

From the start it is clear that Leonce thinks of his wife as his property and not a person. “’You are burnt beyond recognition,’ he added, looking at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property”(7).   What’s wrong? How would you fix it?

Even before Edna is aware of how she changing, she does notice that something about her is different, “An indescribable oppression, which seemed to generate in some unfamiliar part of her consciousness, filled her whole being with a vague anguish”(14).

The narrator points out early on that Edna is different. “Mrs The narrator points out early on that Edna is different. “Mrs. Pontellier was not a mother-women. The mother-women seemed to prevail that summer…fluttering about with extended, protecting wings when any harm…threatened their children”(16). Chopin’s depiction of Adele Ratignolle creates a direct contrast to Edna, “the candor of the woman’s whole existence, which everyone might read, and which formed so striking a contrast to her own habitual reserve”(26).

The narrator’s description of Edna’s inner turmoil reflects the uncertainty and mystery of an epiphany. “Mrs. Pontellier was beginning to realize her position in the universe as a human being, and to recognize her relations as an individual to the world within and about her. This may seem like a ponderous weight of wisdom to descend upon the soul of a young woman of twenty-eight—perhaps more wisdom than the Holy Ghost is usually pleased to vouchsafe to any woman”(25). In the next paragraph, “But the beginning of things, of a world especially, is necessarily vague, tangled, chaotic, and exceedingly disturbing”(25). What’s wrong? How would you fix it?