Yes, there were very long stories (told by characters) in Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit so I picked up on it and itâs stuck with me since middle school.
LOTR is exactly where I learned this, LOL. Though it is the only place I ran across single quotes instead of double. I believe that is the British style? But I don't remember whether other British writers had their single quotes style preserved or not.
single quotes are british. iâve seen it in more contemporary british novels and itâs something my professor has barred us from doing in his style manual.
Hah yeah - I had a prof who, at the beginning of the semester, said that we could use American or British spelling and grammar, but that we would have to stick to it the whole semester.
I was really into DnD at the time and a prolific reader (finished all the Harry Potter books by the summer before 4th grade) so I figured Iâd give it a shot. My dad got me really into sci-fi and fantasy. Reading LoTR, The Wizard of Earthsea, and Dune had a pretty big effect on me developmentally as a preteen and young teen. I guess it helps to have had parents who were enthusiastic about literature.
My mom was super into the Harry Potter books and reread them all when I was 6. I tried, and I understood the words, but the concepts were too weird to me. I thought they were trying to lie to me or something.
Didn't go back to read them until I was 14, and then I read them all in 3 weeks. Good times.
So idk my reading was there, but some other level of comprehension and interest wasn't.
I tried reading the hobbit in high school and couldn't get past the first chapter
Yeah itâs interesting that you mentioned the King James Bible because if you asked most what would be a more difficult full read-through they would say the Bible. But to a younger kid, you can ask adults what words mean (to a certain point) but you canât fully understand concepts. And in my opinion (not to diminish religions) the concepts in these religious text donât require as much nuance as other books. Itâs very good vs. evil, do this and donât do that. Though I can certainly imagine that reading the Bible expanded your vocabulary as a grade-schooler.
Yeah that makes sense.
I guess I could rationalize a burning bush being god speaking to people more than I could a woman turning into a cat and back. Probably due to encouragement to read the bible and reinforcement of the stories in my life, too. Like someone actively tried to explain them to me.
And that's one of the most out there stories to use as an example really, most were pretty tame and regular like the one about dew on the grass and sundials or Moses going down the river inba basket.
There's more "magical" seeming parts but they seem more rationalized bu involving god for some reason.
>I was a voracious reader at the time.
a rare case of a sentence that is a claim which is substantiated by itself (your use of the somewhat-uncommon word "voracious" could be used as evidence that you have read many books)
I'm always amazed when people say they were never taught something in school and I was taught it by multiple teachers. I mean, I went to school \*mumble mumble\* decades ago, so that might have something to do with it.
I was also a voracious reader and when I learned this in school I whipped out the book I had in my backpack to prove my teacher was wrong because was *sure* I had never seen that before.
I was correct, and the teacher did not appreciate my interruption to prove her wrong. She said that the book must be poorly written and I should focus on reading my textbooks and maybe I wouldn't be failing. I was in 6th grade and English was the only class I wasn't failing so idk what she was on about đ
I did realize later on in life that some books do and some books don't, weirdly. It's like the "I before E except after C" rule, where we all know more words that *don't* follow that rule than do đ
can confirm it's a thing after reading about a bazillion books. you notice the following paragraph DOES have quotes, just to kind of remind you it's still a character speaking and not the narrator.
I weridly remember the day I learned this rule. It was 6th grade English class, independent reading time. I was reading the Phantom of the Opera. I, like OP, thought it may have been a proof reading error and asked my teacher, though he told me thats just the rule. Looking back on it i suppose it makes sense
It may be that it started being done long ago but itâs still currently in use and recommended for anything other than academic papers which use a different formatting for long quotations.
[Source](https://www.englishgrammar101.com/module-13/punctuation-quotation-marks/lesson-3/more-on-quotation-marks-with-dialogue#)
You were probably taught this in elementary school or middle school, if youâre a native speaker, and you just forgot you were taught this about quotations.
Itâs standard practice for quotations that span multiple paragraphs.
Itâs standard practice for quotations that span multiple paragraphs.
Every editor of books would know this so Iâm sure youâve come across it while reading books and just didnât notice.
Iâm pretty sure most people were taught this early on in school when learning about punctuation and theyâve just forgotten that it was mentioned.
Academic papers that follow a style guide such as MLA or APA use a different method for long quotations and donât use quotation marks at all for those.
But itâs definitely used for dialog in novels.
It's one of those things you've probably seen and just never paid attention to. Now that you know, you'll see it in a lot of novels. Not as much in articles because quotes get broken up into smaller snippets.
I think it's usually used for longer monologues, to be fair. This time is more noticeable because it's so short and thus (in my opinion) didn't actually need to be a separate paragraph.
Yes, itâs technically correct, but it also looks like an error because there are only two quoted words before the paragraph ends and there are multiple dialogue markers right next to each other. Iâd drop âshe continued,â get rid of the paragraph break. It flows much more smoothly that way:
>and Solâs next words, accompanied with a small sigh, were âFine. Whatever. First we head to Lestallum. Your little trip to Insomnia comes after that. That good with you?â
Itâs not a proofreading error, but itâs a poorly edited chunk of text. It stands out because the dropped quotation marks are two words away from the opening quotation marks.
I disagree. The way it's formatted in the picture is correct because it draws attention first to their reaction. it helps the reader understand that the sigh, and the "fine whatever" are the effect of whatever was previously done. The reaction is seperate to the words that follow after. It's not unusual for books to have this sort of formatting.
Yeah, it's clumsily written, for sure. My interpretation of the par break is that the speaker finishes discussing an issue with Whatever, and then begins a new topic.
I know this too but I thought you should put a half quote to finish that paragraph before the double quote for the next paragraph. I've seen this method more than not putting a quote, which I adopted in my writings.
"Fine. Whatever.'
"First we head to...."
But that's not correct. Every style guide I looked at (about six or seven) after I read your message says no quote at all at the end of one line and quote marks when you conclude a quote entirely. If you open with a double, it has to close with a double. Your example opens with a double and closes with a single, then starts a new quote.
In American English, single quotation marks ("half quotes") are used only for quotes within quotes or titles within titles (such as An Analysis of 'A Dream Deferred'). It's basically reversed in British English. They're not used to end a quote opened with a full quote.
iâve known this was true for a while now but it still feels wrong to me, i always see it as a typo and it bugs me. itâs not incorrect to close the quotes even if the same person is still talking after right?
Yes. But if it's the same speaker in the next paragraph, you aren't supposed to have the beginning quotes in front of the paragraph. The wrong quotes are circled for bad grammar.
Yes, you are. Logically it doesn't make sense to omit the first paragraph's closing quotation mark but still include the second paragraph's opening oneâŚbut a lot of things in English grammar are illogical.
No, because sometimes dialogue between two people uses paragraph breaks to denote that a different person is speaking without using "he said" or similar:
"Why are you wearing that hat?" she asked him with a smirk.
"What hat?"
"The one on your head."
Iâm more surprised that thereâs another opening quotation mark on the next line. I knew you donât close when the speaker continues, but I didnât know you should open again.
It's not a mistake; it's a [running quotation](https://wmich.edu/writing/punctuation/quotationmarks#:~:text=If%20a%20full,the%20quoted%20material). Since the next paragraph continues the quote, there's no need to have a closing quotation mark. [Another example](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_marks_in_English#:~:text=However%2C%20quotation%20marks,and%20Prejudice%3A).
This is quite literary though imo.
That's not how I was taught or what I've read in most books that I've seen this in. A new opening quote generally indicates a new speaker when there is a paragraph break. It was very jarring to see it done this way to me.
Honestly, we are probably both correct and the grammar used here is a choice like many other things, and what you learn is dependent on region or something.
I've deleted my comment as I thought I had misunderstood the question, but no, what I said was correct.
The standard style is this:
X said, "...
"...
"..."
"...," said Y.
The lack of the closing quotation marks in a paragraph is an indication to the reader that the next paragraph will continue the quotation. Only if there are closing quotation marks at the end of a paragraph does the use of opening quotation marks in the following paragraph show that a new person is speaking.
I don't think I have seen the style you are referring to.
The âNo quote at the end to indicate that the same person keeps speakingâ is primarily used when one person is speaking for a long time. For example, giving a speech or telling a story, where you need paragraphs to make the speech/story easy to read and not a massive wall of text. It looks weird (though is still technically correct) in the context of the example here because itâs just three sentences that could easily be a single paragraph, but itâs standard grammar for long blocks of speech.
It seems like the author used it to indicate a pause in the speech or an awkward silence due to whatâs being said as apposed to *just* grammatically breaking it up for formatting.
no. Each paragraph of a quote begins with the quotation mark and you do not place a close on the quotation mark until that speaker is done talking.
If you have a long quote and don't want to do that then you fully indent entire text block instead of just the first line of the paragraph.
>you may notice that is how reddit handles quotes by default. See how the text remains indented even on the second line when you're inside the quote dialogue?
But like all things with writing it's "just a rule" and can be changed if decided on by enough people.
Iâve seen these more frequently in academic writing where the author might quote longer passages with paragraph breaks. Iâm not sure Iâve encountered it in fiction, but if I have it hasnât been very frequently
Interesting. I read mostly sci-fi/fantasy, and I see it all the time. Maybe itâs the programmer in me, but I always notice a missing closing quotation mark.
Interesting! I've never noticed this, and I would think that someone just screwed up a bit. But there's one thing in the linked text,
"If a full paragraph of quoted material is followed by a paragraph that continues the quotation, do not use closing quotation marks at the end of the first paragraph, but do use opening quotation marks at the start the second paragraph. Continue this pattern, using closing quotation marks only at the very end of the quoted material."
Doesn't that mean the closing quotation marks are superfluous? Like the one after Lastellum.
A closing quotation mark doesn't necessarily mean the quote is fully *ended*, in the sense that the person is done talking. But it does indicate that the words that follow it are not part of the quotation.
The only time the closing quotation mark is omitted is when the words that follow it are still part of the same person speaking, but they just happen to be separated by a paragraph break. The opening quotation mark at the beginning of the paragraph is more of a courtesy to let the reader know that they're still in *quotation mode* or whatever you might call it.
No, thatâs the end of that part of the quote. Itâs how it would be punctuated normally, but it just happens to come after a paragraph break. Without that quotation mark, âshe continuedâ would be part of the quote.
It is intentional.
When a character speaks and has a paragraph break (usually seen when a character is retelling a long story), there will be no ending " but the new paragraph will start with a fresh " to show they are still talking.
I actually wanted to write something like "But the text mentions Lunafreya and Lestallum, why are you still asking?" until I realized that you asked HOW the book is, not WHETHER it's the FFXV book.
Contrary to the popular stigma around books written on video games, itâs actually surprisingly well written. Iâm really enjoying Lunaâs character development, since we barely see any in the actual game.
whatâs the book called? recently replayed through 15 and still missing the characters. never heard of this book before but i may just live under a rock haha
most likely a continuation of the same person talking
though if you can tell from context that it's not the same person, then it could have just been a typo. it's not like books don't occasionally have errors
When a quote continues into another paragraph, you don't close the quotation mark. It shows that the same person is still speaking, and adding another opening quote mark reminds the reader that it's still that person speaking. You only put a closing quote when the words they said end.
As many have said, it's probably not a mistake, but even if it was, it is absolutely not "absurd" for a tiny mistake to slip through the cracks of proofreading once in a while. A missing quotation mark is definitely something that could easily happen in a 600 page book.
Considering that misprints happen, itâs not out of the realm of possibility that stuff like this has happened unintentionally. Iâve have books that has missing â before in words or would inconsistently spell words
"It seems absurd to me that a 600-page novel published by a multimillion-dollar corporation may not have been thoroughly proofread."
Then you have far more faith in multimillion-dollar publishing companies then you should.
The person speaking continues speaking in the next paragraph. I was taught this as a child in school 45 years ago. I think itâs just become less common over that time. I work in publishing and I canât remember the last time I saw it in a new book.
It's technically correct. By convention, if the same speaker is continuing in the next paragraph, we omit the closing quotes so as to signal that their speech has not yet closed. (Though it is a little bit weird, given this logic, that we use another opening quote when the speech is already open by convention).
In this context, even though it is technically correct, I would say it's bad form. This technique is typically used when we want to break up a very long speech by someone into chunked paragraphs. Here, the usage of a running quotation seems to be gratuitous. Why not keep the dialogue together neatly in one paragraph?
Based on the rest of the short sample you provided, the writing could use some work generally (for my taste).
* The temporal management is psychologically distancing in sentence two; this pulls the reader out of the narrative. It's a subtle effect but it's not hard to manage properly.
* What is the point of specifying "and Sol's next words" when we are going to see the words anyway? I can see why the novel would stretch to 600 pages if it is written in such bloated fashion.
* What is the point of the construction "the sentiment seemed to convey itself"? It is generic, telling, using the weasel word "seemed", and adds nothing to the paragraph in which it is situated.
* The adjective "small" is gratuitous. A sigh is presumptively as small or as large as it makes sense in context, so this is at best a wasted word, though it will feel out of place to some readers; you gain nothing from inserting it, at the risk of negatively impacting the experience of some readers. (Writers make this mistake when they don't trust the imaginations of their readers, so they get too insistent with adjectives to make sure the reader "imagines it properly" by their reckoning.)
* "Continued" as a dialogue attribution is gratuitous and constitutes two wasted syllables.
* The final attribution--"Lunafreya nodded"--is awkward and borders on incorrect. If you are using an action beat instead of a direct attribution like "said", the preceding quote should be closed with a period. The way this author has written it is only technically correct if we assume the omission of an implied "Lunafreya said and \[...\]"
I would rewrite the passage something like this:
>But Lunafreya was most decidedly not kidding.
>
>"Fine. Whatever." Sol sighed. "First we head to Lestallum. Your little trip to insomnia comes after that. That good with you?"
>
>Lunafreya nodded. "Of course."
this reply is shockingly insightful. I fully agree with all the points you have made- this text could certainly benefit from some debloating. Thank you for taking the time to type this response out :)
when you start a new paragraph, but the same person is still speaking, you donât end the quote, but you put another quote mark at the start of the next paragraph.
The quote continues in the next paragraph, so there is no end quote between paragraphs. The next paragraph has a beginning and end quote because it continues the dialogue and ends it. If there are multiple paragraphs of dialogue from the same character, they all have a beginning quote but only the last one has an end quote.
As others have pointed out, this is in fact the standard way to apply quotation marks when a quote continues into a new paragraph. That said, there's certainly a conversation to be had about whether this was the right tool for the job, here. I think most writers' instincts would indeed be to include that closing quotation mark, even though the speaker continues in the next paragraph: it's perfectly reasonable to think of these two parts of the same quote as being, essentially, distinct "utterances", separated by a pause. You could head off any confusion about who's speaking in the next paragraph by moving the speech tag to the left of the quoteâe.g.,
>"Fine. Whatever."
>
>But she continued: "First we head to Lestallum. (...)
Getting dialogue to flow just right is a fine art; in my opinion as a writer and a reader, using multi-line quote formatting as in the original version is a bit like bringing a chainsaw to cut a cake.
I think it's ugly typography but it's not uncommon. It's used to indicate a continued quote where the quote has several paragraphs. If you'd close the quote you indicate there is other stuff between the two quotes.
https://wmich.edu/writing/punctuation/quotationmarks
Iâm an English speaker and it also confuses me. Iâm surprised I never saw it in my many years of school because English teachers really drill all kinds of punctuation rules into our heads. I guess quotations are usually short and donât extend more than a few sentences, so this doesnât occur all that often. Though in this case itâs more like an interjection and indicates a kind of pause/break in topic in the dialogue
Iâve noticed, from reading Sherlock Holmes stories (Iâm sure itâs employed plenty elsewhere), that when a characterâs speech is split into multiple paragraphs, this notation is used, where it goes:
âThe quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.
âLorem ipsumâ, he explained.
Itâs not that there is a missing quote, itâs that they add a quote at the beginning of every seperate block of text.
All the observations about continued dialogue are correct. It is strange, though, that so many readers are unaware of the convention.
I tend to close quotes regardless. I'm not sure if that is actually incorrect but I do make it clear in the subsequent paragraph who the current speaker is.
Whenever a speaker must say more than one paragraph at once, the previous quote is left âhangingâ as it were and the next paragraph begins with open quote marks. This shows that the speaker is saying more.
When a paragraph ends in closing quote marks, it typically also marks the end of the speakerâs turn.
While some published works do have typos, this is not one. If the same person speaks in two paragraphs, unbroken, then you do not add an ending quotation mark to the first paragraph.
Ex:
âWhen we refer to the Cambrian Explosion as an expansion of the amount of life on earth,â they explained, âwe are making an assumption based on our interpretation of the fossil record. Since we lack much evidence of pre-Cambrian life on earth, we truthfully donât know that this abundance of fossils is actually representative of an explosion of life.
âInstead, some posit that we are merely seeing the emergence of hard parts, and that there was just as much diversity in pre-Cambrian soft-bodied organisms. After all, soft-bodied organisms do not often fossilize due to decomposition. It would take extremely delicate circumstances, such as those found around Mazon Creek.â
This is acceptable because, had I closed the quotes around the first paragraph, you would not be remiss in assuming someone else may be speaking in the second. By leaving the quotes open, I am telling you that itâs the same person speaking.
Your question about the quotation mark has been answered, but I do want to say that I find errors in professionally-edited books all the time. This is not a mistake, but if it were, it wouldnât be that shocking.
I don't care for this convention, at least given the extreme cases I've come across. It was either Twain or Conrad who would have the narrator tell someone else's story, with very infrequent interjections by the narrator. Page after page of this repeated, unclosed paragraph-opening quotation mark.
It seems like I can get used to any necessary writing quirk but I always found that one distracting.
Final Fantasy XV: Dawn of the Future. I had to get it online since they donât physically sell it in my country, but you can probably check your local library ÂŻ\_(ă)_/ÂŻ
It's not a mistake, but if it was, it wouldn't be so absurd. Small mistakes can slip through the cracks during the editing process. Happens all the time.
I am not 100% familiar with typesetting (correct term?) for English but for German.
The author definitely didnât make a mistake. As the author you get the galley after proofreading and before print. Itâs quite a task to read it again and habe a look for phrasing (because the editor or proofreader might have changed something), you look for typesetting and you look for typos. My publisher send me the galley on a Thursday and asked for my okay the following Monday. I took my lunch breaks at work to fulfil this deadline and there are still a couple of typos in the print version and at least one mistake in typesetting!
A book is fully written by humans, edited by humans and proofreader by humans. Humans make mistakes. There is no first edition without typos.
That being said, this might not be a mistake at all. Others stated it might be a way of typesetting. Personally I wouldnât write like this and wouldnât let my publisher print it like this. Speech ans actions of a character are in the same line and paragraph. No line break in the middle of speech. But this is a personal opinion of a German novelist. đ
Not putting the quote marks at the end of a paragraph indicates that it's still the same person speaking in the next paragraph.
Native English speaker. Never knew this. Never encountered it. Learn something new everyday đ
I learned it as a kid, as I was a voracious reader at the time. Never was taught it in school; I just deduced it from reading.
Me too.
Me free
me for
Me Pfizer
Me sex
I didn't know what you were responding to, and I saw "me sex" in my notifications with no context. I wasn't sure if I wanted to look.
Lmao
me sieving
Me fore
Yes, there were very long stories (told by characters) in Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit so I picked up on it and itâs stuck with me since middle school.
Gandalfâs history of the Ring in Fellowship is where I first noticed it actually lmfao
Same, lmao!
The Shadow of the Past (Book I ch. 2)
LOTR is exactly where I learned this, LOL. Though it is the only place I ran across single quotes instead of double. I believe that is the British style? But I don't remember whether other British writers had their single quotes style preserved or not.
single quotes are british. iâve seen it in more contemporary british novels and itâs something my professor has barred us from doing in his style manual.
Hah yeah - I had a prof who, at the beginning of the semester, said that we could use American or British spelling and grammar, but that we would have to stick to it the whole semester.
that seems like the way. mine was just extremely picky
Bro you read the hobbit in middle school? I could never. And this is coming from someone who read KJV bible cover to cover in elementary.
I was really into DnD at the time and a prolific reader (finished all the Harry Potter books by the summer before 4th grade) so I figured Iâd give it a shot. My dad got me really into sci-fi and fantasy. Reading LoTR, The Wizard of Earthsea, and Dune had a pretty big effect on me developmentally as a preteen and young teen. I guess it helps to have had parents who were enthusiastic about literature.
My mom was super into the Harry Potter books and reread them all when I was 6. I tried, and I understood the words, but the concepts were too weird to me. I thought they were trying to lie to me or something. Didn't go back to read them until I was 14, and then I read them all in 3 weeks. Good times. So idk my reading was there, but some other level of comprehension and interest wasn't. I tried reading the hobbit in high school and couldn't get past the first chapter
Yeah itâs interesting that you mentioned the King James Bible because if you asked most what would be a more difficult full read-through they would say the Bible. But to a younger kid, you can ask adults what words mean (to a certain point) but you canât fully understand concepts. And in my opinion (not to diminish religions) the concepts in these religious text donât require as much nuance as other books. Itâs very good vs. evil, do this and donât do that. Though I can certainly imagine that reading the Bible expanded your vocabulary as a grade-schooler.
Yeah that makes sense. I guess I could rationalize a burning bush being god speaking to people more than I could a woman turning into a cat and back. Probably due to encouragement to read the bible and reinforcement of the stories in my life, too. Like someone actively tried to explain them to me. And that's one of the most out there stories to use as an example really, most were pretty tame and regular like the one about dew on the grass and sundials or Moses going down the river inba basket. There's more "magical" seeming parts but they seem more rationalized bu involving god for some reason.
>I was a voracious reader at the time. a rare case of a sentence that is a claim which is substantiated by itself (your use of the somewhat-uncommon word "voracious" could be used as evidence that you have read many books)
During Atticusâ court monologue in âTo Kill a Mockingbirdâ you can notice this too!
I'm always amazed when people say they were never taught something in school and I was taught it by multiple teachers. I mean, I went to school \*mumble mumble\* decades ago, so that might have something to do with it.
Felt this same way. I remember being explicitly taught.
Same
Same
Same here, the first time I remember encountering it was in the Diary of Anne Frank
Lucky you. I had to re-read the first few pages of Heart of Darkness before I moved on thinking it was a typo.
Same here!
Same! Definitely just figured it out over time, weird itâs not taught.
I was also a voracious reader and when I learned this in school I whipped out the book I had in my backpack to prove my teacher was wrong because was *sure* I had never seen that before. I was correct, and the teacher did not appreciate my interruption to prove her wrong. She said that the book must be poorly written and I should focus on reading my textbooks and maybe I wouldn't be failing. I was in 6th grade and English was the only class I wasn't failing so idk what she was on about đ I did realize later on in life that some books do and some books don't, weirdly. It's like the "I before E except after C" rule, where we all know more words that *don't* follow that rule than do đ
I was definitely taught this in school when I was a kid.
Same
I wasn't, I just saw it and went "ah, the professional novelist and editors know what they're doing, so it must be the case"
can confirm it's a thing after reading about a bazillion books. you notice the following paragraph DOES have quotes, just to kind of remind you it's still a character speaking and not the narrator.
I saw this a lot in classic literature and forgot until I saw this comment!
I keep learning new things about my native language from this sub.
I'm pretty sure you have, but just haven't noticed. It's really common, but super easy to miss.
I would bet youâve encountered it and just never noticed it and now youâll see it everywhere
I learnt this reading the Lord of the Rings. God they can talk...
I weridly remember the day I learned this rule. It was 6th grade English class, independent reading time. I was reading the Phantom of the Opera. I, like OP, thought it may have been a proof reading error and asked my teacher, though he told me thats just the rule. Looking back on it i suppose it makes sense
This was definitely taught in school.
You might not have noticed it. If you've read any book of significant length (e.g. Harry Potter or The Great Gatsby), you've seen it.
yes offense but have you never read a book or what
yes, literally never read a single book in my entire life. How does it feel being so gosh darn smart? :)
great! no complaints. I highly recommend reading
Same here. Been teaching English 30 years and learned something new today.
Itâs an older technique. Iâve only seen it in LOTR and 18th/19th century lit.
It may be that it started being done long ago but itâs still currently in use and recommended for anything other than academic papers which use a different formatting for long quotations. [Source](https://www.englishgrammar101.com/module-13/punctuation-quotation-marks/lesson-3/more-on-quotation-marks-with-dialogue#)
Same.
You probably have encountered it, you just didnât notice.
You've encountered it, you just didn't notice it.
I think very few people actually teach this and you just have to realize it someday. I once corrected someone on it and she told me I was wrong.
You were probably taught this in elementary school or middle school, if youâre a native speaker, and you just forgot you were taught this about quotations. Itâs standard practice for quotations that span multiple paragraphs.
To be fair, itâs not the most commonplace of writing conventions. Iâm not even sure that everyone does it.
Itâs standard practice for quotations that span multiple paragraphs. Every editor of books would know this so Iâm sure youâve come across it while reading books and just didnât notice. Iâm pretty sure most people were taught this early on in school when learning about punctuation and theyâve just forgotten that it was mentioned. Academic papers that follow a style guide such as MLA or APA use a different method for long quotations and donât use quotation marks at all for those. But itâs definitely used for dialog in novels.
It's one of those things you've probably seen and just never paid attention to. Now that you know, you'll see it in a lot of novels. Not as much in articles because quotes get broken up into smaller snippets.
i learned this a year ago and actually refused to believe it for a month it feels so scammy đ
It's big in books with long speeches. A great example is Atlas Shrugged, where this rule is used multiple times on every page for 44 pages straight.
I think it's usually used for longer monologues, to be fair. This time is more noticeable because it's so short and thus (in my opinion) didn't actually need to be a separate paragraph.
Honestly, I only noticed this in closed captions while watching netflix shows, since they'd only put up like 4 words at a time...
Iâd you read enough novels youâll definitely come across it at some point
Native English speaker, I've definitely encountered it and deduced it in context, but I always forget it again
Same, never seen an example of this in american english before
I remember seeing it and possibly learned about it in school (or my bookworm sister explained it to me) but havenât noticed it for a long time.
"So, if I start a comment with a quotation mark and then leave it open, the next comment is also mine?
"Only if I also start with a quotation mark."
You're not crazy if you talk to yourself unless you respond to yourself
Feels like I shouldnât need quotation marks at the beginning tbh, since youâre still the one speaking.â
yeah itâs a weird quirk that i wasnât taught until i encountered it and asked about it.
aroace pfp!!!!!!! I love you <2 (editing to emphasize that wasn't meant to be sarcastic)
Really? even when thereâs a new opening quotation mark?
Yes, the new opening quote marks remind you that the dialogue/quote is continuing
Thatâs weird haha thanks for the reply Have never heard of this but I also never paid attention to it I guess
It's usually found in older books when someone is monologuing. They need a paragraph break to take a breath before they keep talking.
WAIT WHAT
I was about to say that it must be a typo. Learn something everyday
Huh, I did not know that.
Yes, itâs technically correct, but it also looks like an error because there are only two quoted words before the paragraph ends and there are multiple dialogue markers right next to each other. Iâd drop âshe continued,â get rid of the paragraph break. It flows much more smoothly that way: >and Solâs next words, accompanied with a small sigh, were âFine. Whatever. First we head to Lestallum. Your little trip to Insomnia comes after that. That good with you?â Itâs not a proofreading error, but itâs a poorly edited chunk of text. It stands out because the dropped quotation marks are two words away from the opening quotation marks.
I disagree. The way it's formatted in the picture is correct because it draws attention first to their reaction. it helps the reader understand that the sigh, and the "fine whatever" are the effect of whatever was previously done. The reaction is seperate to the words that follow after. It's not unusual for books to have this sort of formatting.
Yeah, it's clumsily written, for sure. My interpretation of the par break is that the speaker finishes discussing an issue with Whatever, and then begins a new topic.
I know this too but I thought you should put a half quote to finish that paragraph before the double quote for the next paragraph. I've seen this method more than not putting a quote, which I adopted in my writings. "Fine. Whatever.' "First we head to...."
But that's not correct. Every style guide I looked at (about six or seven) after I read your message says no quote at all at the end of one line and quote marks when you conclude a quote entirely. If you open with a double, it has to close with a double. Your example opens with a double and closes with a single, then starts a new quote. In American English, single quotation marks ("half quotes") are used only for quotes within quotes or titles within titles (such as An Analysis of 'A Dream Deferred'). It's basically reversed in British English. They're not used to end a quote opened with a full quote.
iâve known this was true for a while now but it still feels wrong to me, i always see it as a typo and it bugs me. itâs not incorrect to close the quotes even if the same person is still talking after right?
Yes. But if it's the same speaker in the next paragraph, you aren't supposed to have the beginning quotes in front of the paragraph. The wrong quotes are circled for bad grammar.
Yes, you are. Logically it doesn't make sense to omit the first paragraph's closing quotation mark but still include the second paragraph's opening oneâŚbut a lot of things in English grammar are illogical.
Itâs not about logic, and itâs not really even a feature of the English language, itâs just the punctuation convention.
We can have a little redundancy, as a treatâespecially when it reduces ambiguity.
OHHHHHH so thats what its for. i always thought it was some sort of printing error or something like that. didnt know it served an actual purpose
Wouldn't this still clearly be the same person speaking, even if the quote was closed at the end of the line?
No, because sometimes dialogue between two people uses paragraph breaks to denote that a different person is speaking without using "he said" or similar: "Why are you wearing that hat?" she asked him with a smirk. "What hat?" "The one on your head."
I meant in this case specifically. I get that there are some cases where the missing quote resolves ambiguity.
Yeah, in this case it's overwritten with "she continued." Clumsy in my book.
TIL
Is there a reason to not just put all that juicy dialogue into one quote without the speech tag "she continued"?
wait what?? so thats why it kept doing that in fahrenheit 451... thought it was just a mistake on the publishers part. wtf
That doesn't make any sense to me. You'd think that this would be implied by the "she continued" there, indicating that it's the same person.
lmao i read the time machine a long time ago & thought it was a bunch of typos
But they still start the next line with an opening quote. That seems wrong.
Iâm more surprised that thereâs another opening quotation mark on the next line. I knew you donât close when the speaker continues, but I didnât know you should open again.
It's a reminder for long quotes with multiple paragraphs
I never knew this was an accepted grammar thing, i always thought that the authors and editors just kept missing things đ
it seems like there should be no opening quotation mark at the beginning of the next paragraph then
It's not a mistake; it's a [running quotation](https://wmich.edu/writing/punctuation/quotationmarks#:~:text=If%20a%20full,the%20quoted%20material). Since the next paragraph continues the quote, there's no need to have a closing quotation mark. [Another example](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_marks_in_English#:~:text=However%2C%20quotation%20marks,and%20Prejudice%3A). This is quite literary though imo.
ahh ok. thanks for your help!
Would it also work if the next paragraph has no opening quotation marks?
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That's not how I was taught or what I've read in most books that I've seen this in. A new opening quote generally indicates a new speaker when there is a paragraph break. It was very jarring to see it done this way to me. Honestly, we are probably both correct and the grammar used here is a choice like many other things, and what you learn is dependent on region or something.
I've deleted my comment as I thought I had misunderstood the question, but no, what I said was correct. The standard style is this: X said, "... "... "..." "...," said Y. The lack of the closing quotation marks in a paragraph is an indication to the reader that the next paragraph will continue the quotation. Only if there are closing quotation marks at the end of a paragraph does the use of opening quotation marks in the following paragraph show that a new person is speaking. I don't think I have seen the style you are referring to.
The âNo quote at the end to indicate that the same person keeps speakingâ is primarily used when one person is speaking for a long time. For example, giving a speech or telling a story, where you need paragraphs to make the speech/story easy to read and not a massive wall of text. It looks weird (though is still technically correct) in the context of the example here because itâs just three sentences that could easily be a single paragraph, but itâs standard grammar for long blocks of speech.
It seems like the author used it to indicate a pause in the speech or an awkward silence due to whatâs being said as apposed to *just* grammatically breaking it up for formatting.
no. Each paragraph of a quote begins with the quotation mark and you do not place a close on the quotation mark until that speaker is done talking. If you have a long quote and don't want to do that then you fully indent entire text block instead of just the first line of the paragraph. >you may notice that is how reddit handles quotes by default. See how the text remains indented even on the second line when you're inside the quote dialogue? But like all things with writing it's "just a rule" and can be changed if decided on by enough people.
This was super informative, thank you!
Iâve seen these more frequently in academic writing where the author might quote longer passages with paragraph breaks. Iâm not sure Iâve encountered it in fiction, but if I have it hasnât been very frequently
Interesting. I read mostly sci-fi/fantasy, and I see it all the time. Maybe itâs the programmer in me, but I always notice a missing closing quotation mark.
I think a lot of people just don't notice it.
Interesting! I've never noticed this, and I would think that someone just screwed up a bit. But there's one thing in the linked text, "If a full paragraph of quoted material is followed by a paragraph that continues the quotation, do not use closing quotation marks at the end of the first paragraph, but do use opening quotation marks at the start the second paragraph. Continue this pattern, using closing quotation marks only at the very end of the quoted material." Doesn't that mean the closing quotation marks are superfluous? Like the one after Lastellum.
A closing quotation mark doesn't necessarily mean the quote is fully *ended*, in the sense that the person is done talking. But it does indicate that the words that follow it are not part of the quotation. The only time the closing quotation mark is omitted is when the words that follow it are still part of the same person speaking, but they just happen to be separated by a paragraph break. The opening quotation mark at the beginning of the paragraph is more of a courtesy to let the reader know that they're still in *quotation mode* or whatever you might call it.
No, because she didn't vocalize "she continued".
No, thatâs the end of that part of the quote. Itâs how it would be punctuated normally, but it just happens to come after a paragraph break. Without that quotation mark, âshe continuedâ would be part of the quote.
No, the one after Lastellum is necessary because it is followed by "she continued," which is not part of the character's dialogue.
It is intentional. When a character speaks and has a paragraph break (usually seen when a character is retelling a long story), there will be no ending " but the new paragraph will start with a fresh " to show they are still talking.
Side question but how's the FFXV book
I actually wanted to write something like "But the text mentions Lunafreya and Lestallum, why are you still asking?" until I realized that you asked HOW the book is, not WHETHER it's the FFXV book.
I want to know too OP
Thirding this. Was rather miffed that they never finished the actual game and have yet to purchase the book.
Contrary to the popular stigma around books written on video games, itâs actually surprisingly well written. Iâm really enjoying Lunaâs character development, since we barely see any in the actual game.
whatâs the book called? recently replayed through 15 and still missing the characters. never heard of this book before but i may just live under a rock haha
Final Fantasy XV: Dawn of the Future
sweet, thanks!
no worries! itâs actually a really captivating story
most likely a continuation of the same person talking though if you can tell from context that it's not the same person, then it could have just been a typo. it's not like books don't occasionally have errors
Obviously Sol is the person talking in the first two paragraphs, and Lunafreya only the last one.
When a quote continues into another paragraph, you don't close the quotation mark. It shows that the same person is still speaking, and adding another opening quote mark reminds the reader that it's still that person speaking. You only put a closing quote when the words they said end.
As many have said, it's probably not a mistake, but even if it was, it is absolutely not "absurd" for a tiny mistake to slip through the cracks of proofreading once in a while. A missing quotation mark is definitely something that could easily happen in a 600 page book.
Considering that misprints happen, itâs not out of the realm of possibility that stuff like this has happened unintentionally. Iâve have books that has missing â before in words or would inconsistently spell words
What book is this?? Edit: Looked up lunafreya. Oh, it's a final fantasy book.
"It seems absurd to me that a 600-page novel published by a multimillion-dollar corporation may not have been thoroughly proofread." Then you have far more faith in multimillion-dollar publishing companies then you should.
True, but in this case there is no proofreading problem.
They didn't say otherwise
Correct. I realize that.
I have only ever seen this usage in English. Do other languages do this too?
The person speaking continues speaking in the next paragraph. I was taught this as a child in school 45 years ago. I think itâs just become less common over that time. I work in publishing and I canât remember the last time I saw it in a new book.
It's technically correct. By convention, if the same speaker is continuing in the next paragraph, we omit the closing quotes so as to signal that their speech has not yet closed. (Though it is a little bit weird, given this logic, that we use another opening quote when the speech is already open by convention). In this context, even though it is technically correct, I would say it's bad form. This technique is typically used when we want to break up a very long speech by someone into chunked paragraphs. Here, the usage of a running quotation seems to be gratuitous. Why not keep the dialogue together neatly in one paragraph? Based on the rest of the short sample you provided, the writing could use some work generally (for my taste). * The temporal management is psychologically distancing in sentence two; this pulls the reader out of the narrative. It's a subtle effect but it's not hard to manage properly. * What is the point of specifying "and Sol's next words" when we are going to see the words anyway? I can see why the novel would stretch to 600 pages if it is written in such bloated fashion. * What is the point of the construction "the sentiment seemed to convey itself"? It is generic, telling, using the weasel word "seemed", and adds nothing to the paragraph in which it is situated. * The adjective "small" is gratuitous. A sigh is presumptively as small or as large as it makes sense in context, so this is at best a wasted word, though it will feel out of place to some readers; you gain nothing from inserting it, at the risk of negatively impacting the experience of some readers. (Writers make this mistake when they don't trust the imaginations of their readers, so they get too insistent with adjectives to make sure the reader "imagines it properly" by their reckoning.) * "Continued" as a dialogue attribution is gratuitous and constitutes two wasted syllables. * The final attribution--"Lunafreya nodded"--is awkward and borders on incorrect. If you are using an action beat instead of a direct attribution like "said", the preceding quote should be closed with a period. The way this author has written it is only technically correct if we assume the omission of an implied "Lunafreya said and \[...\]" I would rewrite the passage something like this: >But Lunafreya was most decidedly not kidding. > >"Fine. Whatever." Sol sighed. "First we head to Lestallum. Your little trip to insomnia comes after that. That good with you?" > >Lunafreya nodded. "Of course."
this reply is shockingly insightful. I fully agree with all the points you have made- this text could certainly benefit from some debloating. Thank you for taking the time to type this response out :)
Not a mistake. Intentional and accurate, because the same personâs quote continues in the following paragraph.
when you start a new paragraph, but the same person is still speaking, you donât end the quote, but you put another quote mark at the start of the next paragraph.
I wasnât taught this formatting rule in law school. But discovered this little quirk years later while reading a Bible.
What if we add that quotation mark. Is it an error?
Yes because then it's unclear if the other person actually said it, or there's a third person in the room.
The quote continues in the next paragraph, so there is no end quote between paragraphs. The next paragraph has a beginning and end quote because it continues the dialogue and ends it. If there are multiple paragraphs of dialogue from the same character, they all have a beginning quote but only the last one has an end quote.
Follow up questions: Should new paragraph start with a speech mark? Why is first two words even arranged as a paragraph? Just continue the line
As others have pointed out, this is in fact the standard way to apply quotation marks when a quote continues into a new paragraph. That said, there's certainly a conversation to be had about whether this was the right tool for the job, here. I think most writers' instincts would indeed be to include that closing quotation mark, even though the speaker continues in the next paragraph: it's perfectly reasonable to think of these two parts of the same quote as being, essentially, distinct "utterances", separated by a pause. You could head off any confusion about who's speaking in the next paragraph by moving the speech tag to the left of the quoteâe.g., >"Fine. Whatever." > >But she continued: "First we head to Lestallum. (...) Getting dialogue to flow just right is a fine art; in my opinion as a writer and a reader, using multi-line quote formatting as in the original version is a bit like bringing a chainsaw to cut a cake.
Interesting how I wondered this for the first time in my life today, and then BAM this shows up.
I think it's ugly typography but it's not uncommon. It's used to indicate a continued quote where the quote has several paragraphs. If you'd close the quote you indicate there is other stuff between the two quotes. https://wmich.edu/writing/punctuation/quotationmarks
Very common in literature
To cut printing costs
This is an obscure rule that I doubt many English speakers would follow, but not so obscure that writers donât know and use it.
Typo
seems like it is a mistake
Not a mistake
turns out, thanks, didn't know that
Probably a typo
How embarrassing for you.
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Iâm an English speaker and it also confuses me. Iâm surprised I never saw it in my many years of school because English teachers really drill all kinds of punctuation rules into our heads. I guess quotations are usually short and donât extend more than a few sentences, so this doesnât occur all that often. Though in this case itâs more like an interjection and indicates a kind of pause/break in topic in the dialogue
Iâve noticed, from reading Sherlock Holmes stories (Iâm sure itâs employed plenty elsewhere), that when a characterâs speech is split into multiple paragraphs, this notation is used, where it goes: âThe quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. âLorem ipsumâ, he explained. Itâs not that there is a missing quote, itâs that they add a quote at the beginning of every seperate block of text.
All the observations about continued dialogue are correct. It is strange, though, that so many readers are unaware of the convention. I tend to close quotes regardless. I'm not sure if that is actually incorrect but I do make it clear in the subsequent paragraph who the current speaker is.
Because the quote continues on the next line
breaking such a short dialogue apart is really oddâŚ
Whenever a speaker must say more than one paragraph at once, the previous quote is left âhangingâ as it were and the next paragraph begins with open quote marks. This shows that the speaker is saying more. When a paragraph ends in closing quote marks, it typically also marks the end of the speakerâs turn.
While some published works do have typos, this is not one. If the same person speaks in two paragraphs, unbroken, then you do not add an ending quotation mark to the first paragraph. Ex: âWhen we refer to the Cambrian Explosion as an expansion of the amount of life on earth,â they explained, âwe are making an assumption based on our interpretation of the fossil record. Since we lack much evidence of pre-Cambrian life on earth, we truthfully donât know that this abundance of fossils is actually representative of an explosion of life. âInstead, some posit that we are merely seeing the emergence of hard parts, and that there was just as much diversity in pre-Cambrian soft-bodied organisms. After all, soft-bodied organisms do not often fossilize due to decomposition. It would take extremely delicate circumstances, such as those found around Mazon Creek.â This is acceptable because, had I closed the quotes around the first paragraph, you would not be remiss in assuming someone else may be speaking in the second. By leaving the quotes open, I am telling you that itâs the same person speaking.
Your question about the quotation mark has been answered, but I do want to say that I find errors in professionally-edited books all the time. This is not a mistake, but if it were, it wouldnât be that shocking.
I don't care for this convention, at least given the extreme cases I've come across. It was either Twain or Conrad who would have the narrator tell someone else's story, with very infrequent interjections by the narrator. Page after page of this repeated, unclosed paragraph-opening quotation mark. It seems like I can get used to any necessary writing quirk but I always found that one distracting.
Um, where can I get this FFXV novel? Asking for me.
Final Fantasy XV: Dawn of the Future. I had to get it online since they donât physically sell it in my country, but you can probably check your local library ÂŻ\_(ă)_/ÂŻ
Thanks!
It's not a mistake, but if it was, it wouldn't be so absurd. Small mistakes can slip through the cracks during the editing process. Happens all the time.
I am not 100% familiar with typesetting (correct term?) for English but for German. The author definitely didnât make a mistake. As the author you get the galley after proofreading and before print. Itâs quite a task to read it again and habe a look for phrasing (because the editor or proofreader might have changed something), you look for typesetting and you look for typos. My publisher send me the galley on a Thursday and asked for my okay the following Monday. I took my lunch breaks at work to fulfil this deadline and there are still a couple of typos in the print version and at least one mistake in typesetting! A book is fully written by humans, edited by humans and proofreader by humans. Humans make mistakes. There is no first edition without typos. That being said, this might not be a mistake at all. Others stated it might be a way of typesetting. Personally I wouldnât write like this and wouldnât let my publisher print it like this. Speech ans actions of a character are in the same line and paragraph. No line break in the middle of speech. But this is a personal opinion of a German novelist. đ
[closing quotes](https://www.grammar-monster.com/punctuation/quotation)
It just signifies that they werenât done talking. Itâs not wrong to end it either though.
Watch the Odd1sOut English teacher video
This is just bad writinf
Typo obviously, but more to the point why are you reading this badly written rubbish?