Thread: A question on punctuation

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Originally Posted by Mermaid on the breakwater

Hoho - no you don't put two pieces of punctuation either side of a speech mark.

Use indirect speech for one reason: simplicity.

Jim explained to us how Darren had made it clear the assignment was not due in for another week; the professor had pushed back the deadline because he'd fallen ill.

"That's good news. I've only gathered the test results and haven't started my conclusion yet." Amy said, as we walked through the courtyard.

See how much easier it is?

This is a sentence?? >> Amy said, as we walked through the courtyard. ??

Comma after "yet", methinks.

It's none of your business, as WW would say.

It's maleficia, Ox. You've put a hex on me so that my writing goes down the swanny. I shall have to report back to your owner that you've been raising Beelzebub.

Having looked up the OP's question in three different sources, my best answer would be that Calixto is right.

Originally Posted by http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/quotes.asp

Rule 4. Use single quotation marks for quotes within quotes. Note that the period goes inside all quote marks. Example: He said, "Danea said, 'Do not treat me that way.'"

Originally Posted by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_mark

For speech within speech, the other is used as inner quotation marks:
“HAL said, ‘Good morning, Dave,’ ” recalled Frank.

Originally Posted by http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/GRAMMAR/marks/quotation.htm

A single question mark will suffice to end a quoted question within a question:

• "Didn't he ask, 'What did we do, who preceded you?'" queried Johnson.

Authority for this section: New York Public Library Writer's Guide to Style and Usage HarperCollins: New York. 1994. 277. Cited with permission, examples our own.

As far as I'm concerned you're arguing pointlessly. An ugly sentence is an ulgy sentence. Rewrite it.

"He said it was lame" Dorothy said.

Why twist yourself in knots trying to complicate stuff?

All right...to remove the element of speculation...here's the line.

"What? Did you just wake up one morning and say "Oh, I think I'll call myself Smellmerdeane. Yes, that suits me!

It is spoken more as an exaggerated statement. the speaker is taunting ...being sarcastic. but she is still asking a question. Moment of disbelief... you get the picture.

The bottom line is I do not intend to change the line. I vow to follow your advice on lots of other things, but on this one I'm going to be stubborn.

Ok, I have a question.

It’s about the use of only one of these little buggers >>>> ' in the example quoted throughout this thread and repeated below.I don’t care what name you give it – quotation mark, speech mark, apostrophe, when I was a kid two of them side by side were called inverted commas so that makes it a single inverted comma but what’s in a name - my question is why is it used here in this example in only one place? My understanding of the use of these symbols, whether double or single, is that they are used as a pair, to enclose something - like book-ends - and that means there should be another one at the other end of whatever is enclosed.

And there isn’t.

In case you’ve all forgotten, here’s the example:

Originally Posted by The Wrong Writer
"He said, "This is soooo lame,' and meant it," Dorothy told us.

So, ???

Not that I'm the expert (as most everyone else commenting here seems to think they are), but for what it's worth I would think you'd do it like this:

"What? Did you just wake up one morning and say 'Oh, I think I'll call myself Smellmerdeane. Yes, that suits me!'?"

But having said that, the four punctuation marks in a row does look funny to me. If at all possible I would avoid the situation ... something like:

"What, did you just wake up one morning and say 'Oh, I think I'll call myself Smellmerdeane. Yes, that suits me!' Huh?"

I think that's been suggested already, but maybe it bears repeating, eh? Anyhow, good luck with this madness, J.T.Grunge.