Quotation marks are sprouting up everywhere these days like uncontrolled weeds. Here are some examples from material a client recently sent me:
The reason for this book is to tell about one of the very few times, the “Apache” Indians won. They came out on top, offsetting just a little of the defeat, push back and put down that has been their history since they were forced to live on a ‘reservation’ by us…
With hard work and dedication they became ‘winners’ with all the glory and pride that goes with it…
It took a few years of hard work and determination, to go from “rags to riches”.
I know you’re probably all curious about my client’s book now. I promise I’ll write about it when it’s done, because it’s a great under-dog sports story. But with four instances of inappropriate quotation mark use in just three paragraphs, my writing coach client is clearly having an inappropriate love affair with quotation marks. (How’s that for mixing metaphors? I could also say that he has clearly forgotten to invest in quotation-mark weed killer. And note, I did not use quotation marks on that last bit.)
Of course, there is definitely a time and place for quotation marks. Correct uses for quotation marks include:
- Dialogue. Denoting speech, however, doesn’t include indirectly recounting what someone else has said. Here’s the difference. If you and I had discussed this business of quotation marks, you could quote me directly:
“The overuse of quotation marks has become an epidemic,” Linden says. “People need to go into quotation mark rehab.” [Note that the quotation marks stop and start again in accordance with the words that I’ve actually said and do not include the fact that I’m the one saying them.]
Or you could indirectly recount the conversation:
Linden says that the overuse of quotation marks has become an epidemic and that people need to go into quotation mark rehab. [Note the lack of quotation marks.]
- Material being directly quoted from another source. This can also be set off with italics if it’s a long passage. (Just make sure to identify the source either way.)
- Titles as long as they’re subsets of a whole. A chapter title is denoted by quotation marks, while the book title is italicized. Similarly, the name of a TV series needs to be italicized, but the title of an individual episode gets quotation marks. You would use quotation marks for an article in a magazine. The magazine name gets, you guessed it, italics instead of quotation marks.
- Irony. For example, you could write:
Linden “loves” this over-use of quotation marks. [The quotation marks denote how much I really don’t love the misuse of quotation marks.]
Or in a Facebook post about this short blog post, which might feel a bit heavy or pedantic, you could write:
In a “tome”, Linden decries the over-use of quotation marks.
So here’s to the appropriate use of quotation marks in 2016 and beyond. I’ll end this piece simply by saying, “Happy scribbling!”
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