By Rachel Leitch

I love grammar. I’ve loved studying it ever since I was in middle school. Sometimes I hunt down typos in wall hangings, store signs, and movie subtitles.

What? Doesn’t everyone love grammar?

Alright, truth—sometimes I really hate grammar.

Enjoying grammar is one thing. Using it is entirely different. Especially all those dots and dashes and squiggly lines called punctuation.

And one of the hardest things to punctuate is dialogue. Quotation marks and em dashes and tags and beats . . . why is it even important? Let’s just slap some words on a page for a character to say and call it done.

But, to quote Mary Poppins, “In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun.” I’m going to try to help find the fun (and the purpose) in punctuating dialogue.

Why Care About Punctuation?

Who cares about punctuation, anyway? Does anyone even notice those little dots and dashes? Unless, of course, they’re an English professor, an editor, or fluent in Morse code? Isn’t it the heart of the dialogue that counts?

Yes . . . and no.

You can write the most brilliant piece of dialogue ever written. (Actually, you probably can, after all the fantastic articles other Dragon Slayers have written and will be writing on this topic.) Dialogue that will touch their readers’ hearts. Make them laugh, cry, scream, or do all three simultaneously. Have them quoting it for years to come.

But if that brilliant dialogue looks like this—

We “ are the spark that will light the fire—“ Poe said. “’of the Resistance that will burn the First Order’ down.”

(That hurt my soul.)

Chances are no one will have even read that far. They’ll assume the writer didn’t care enough about the dialogue to punctuate it correctly. And if the author didn’t care about the story, why should they care?

Now let’s dive into the specifics of punctuating dialogue, so everyone will know you care about your story.

Quotation Marks

Let’s start at the very beginning. (It’s a very good place to start.)

We know quotation marks go around the words people say. The curve of your quotation mark should always face the quote. See?

“I am Moana of Motunui.”

But what about if your character is quoting someone else?

If I quote something in the body of an article like this (like I did with Mary Poppins earlier), I’d use those double quotation marks.

But if my character was quoting Mary Poppins, putting that many double quotation marks would just look weird. So I use single ones instead.

“Mary Poppins said, ‘In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun.’”

Make sure to close off those single marks at the end. Quotation marks, whether double or single, always come in pairs.

This rule may also apply if your character is reading something aloud or saying something ironically.

“‘Night Fury. Speed unknown. Size unknown.’”

“But she says that’s ‘not science.’” (Can you hear the air quotes?)

Now, if your character is asking about something someone else said, it gets a little trickier. (Did she really say . . . ?)

“Did she really say, ‘Grammar is fun’?”

Because the quote isn’t the question, the single quote goes before the question mark. If the quote were a question, it would come after.

“She asked, ‘Is punctuation important?’”

Said Tags

Also called dialogue tags, said tags are usually two-word phrases you use to show who is talking and how they’re talking.

-he said

-she yelled

-they demanded

And so on. And wedging those said tags into your dialogue can drown you in red ink.

                       1.      Before the Quote

If your said tag comes before a quote, place a comma after the said word and begin your quote.

Anne mused, “Tomorrow is always fresh, with no mistakes in it.”

                      2.      Between the Quotes

If your said tag comes in the middle of a sentence, there are two different ways to punctuate it.

If it comes between one continuous thought, place a comma on either side of the said tag. Your first comma goes inside the quote to lead to the tag. Your second comma goes at the end of the tag to lead back into the quote.

“In your world,” said Aslan, “I have another name.”

If your said tag comes between two complete sentences, lead in with a comma, then end the tag with a period.

“No,” said Lucy. “But he is good.”

                     3.      After the Quote

If your said tag comes after the quote, end the quote with a comma and your said tag with a period.

“May the Force be with you,” Han said.

                     4.    Questions and Exclamations

If your sentence needs a question mark or exclamation mark, the rules above still apply.

Anne asked, “Aren’t you glad we live in a world with Septembers?”

“For Narnia!” Reepicheep shouted. “And for Aslan!”

“Never tell me the odds!” Han yelled.

Action Beats

But let’s face it—all those said tags get a little boring, don’t they? So we use action beats to break it up a little bit. Action beats still show us who’s talking, but instead of showing us how they’re talking, it shows what they’re doing.

-He kicked the table.

-She stroked the cat.

-They skipped down the lane.

And to keep things easier, they’re punctuated the same as said tags, right?

HA HA HA. NO.

However, they are simpler to punctuate. Action beats always end with a period, because they’re a complete sentence. No matter where they appear in a sentence.

Sam lifted Frodo onto his back. “I can’t carry it for you, but I can carry you.”

“It is alright to cry.” Baymax wrapped his arms around Hiro.

“I wouldn’t kill him because he looked as frightened as I was.” Hiccup met Astrid’s gaze. “I looked at him, and I saw myself.”

Now when we shove an action beat in the middle of a continuous thought, it gets a little trickier.

We have to call up a little something called an em dash.

(Secret: To make an em dash in Microsoft Word, you type two dashes, your word, and a space. It’ll automatically turn it into an em dash.)

The em dash works the same as commas in a continuous thought.

“And I—” Rey raised her lightsaber—“I’m all the Jedi.”

Watch out, though! Em dashes like to mess with quotation marks. Make sure your quotations still face the left, towards your quote. If it’s backwards, type the word before the em dash, then type your quotation marks. After that, add your em dash by typing two dashes and hitting either space or enter. Like so.

word”

Then

word—”

Another little secret Microsoft Word likes to keep from us.

Ellipses Points

And of course, we can’t forget the ellipses points! 

Confession: I have a problem with ellipses points. Namely that I use them too much. 

If it’s happening all the time for dramatic emphasis, you might want to take two or ten or a hundred instances out. But when used sparingly, ellipses points are a great way to show a pause or a voice trailing off.

“And what if it is everything I dreamed it would be . . . What do I do then?”

“That’s the good part, I guess . . . You get to go find a new dream.” 

These sentences could easily be ended by periods. And you probably won’t want two sets of ellipses points right after the other like I just did. But I think you get the idea. It all depends on how you want the sentence to feel or sound in your reader’s head. 

There are two main rules for using ellipses points in dialogue. 

When it’s two complete sentences, you do like I did above and capitalize the first letter of the new sentence after the ellipses. 

When it’s two parts of a complete sentence, that first letter is going to stay lowercase because it’s still in the same sentence. 

“And if it is everything I dreamed it would be . . . what do I do then?”

If your ellipses points are at the end of the sentence, keep them inside the quotation marks. This includes when you’re leading into an action. 

“This is Scruff. I made her, but her head is too big. So I pretend a bug laid eggs in her ears. And she’s upset because she only has a few days to . . .” Lilo looked around. 

And just like em dashes, if an action interrupts, it works the same way. To use another Lilo and Stitch reference: 

“This is my family. I found it all on my own. It’s little and broken. But still good . . .” Stitch looked around . . . “Yeah. Still good.” 

Again, in all these examples, the ellipses points weren’t strictly necessary. So it’ll be up to you to make the call as to whether your dialogue needs ellipses points right now or not. 

Another hidden secret–while Microsoft Word makes it very easy for you to type three dots right after the other, that is not considered correct formatting in the publishing industry. They want to see a space between each dot, like I did above and like I’m about to do here. 

. . . 

Dot, space. Dot, space. Dot, space.

Changing Speakers

But one character can’t just do all the talking all the time, can they? (Well, they could, but it would get very dull very fast.)

There is an important secret about changing speakers in dialogue. A secret that I didn’t know for many years. But it is remarkably simple. 

Every time the speaker changes, the paragraph changes. 

“What if it’s not everything I dreamed it would be?” Rapunzel wondered. 

“It will be,” Flynn replied. 

When I see a paragraph change, my brain is automatically ready for the next thing–in this case, the next speaker. If it was written like this instead:

“What if it’s not everything I dreamed it would be?” Rapunzel wondered. “It will be,” Flynn replied. 

Or even like this: 

“What if it’s not everything I dreamed it would be?” Rapunzel wondered and Flynn replied, “It will be.”

Even though the last example is a complete sentence and makes sense, it seems like a complete thought. And one complete thought is generally given by one speaker.

But What if There Are No Tags or Beats?

“BB-8’s not on fire.” Rey pointed to the Falcon.

“What’s left of him,” Poe shot back. 

“You know what you are?” Rey smirked. “You’re difficult. You’re really difficult. You’re a difficult man.”

“You’re . . . ” Poe growled, then demanded, “You dropped a tree on him?” 

Rey returned, “You blew both sub-alternators?”

Was that incredibly annoying or what? Not the dialogue, the dialogue was great. But the said tags and action beats in every paragraph actually distracted from the dialogue this time. If it’s clear who is talking, like in the example above, then you don’t need a tag or a beat. 

This doesn’t change up the punctuation too much. (Thank goodness.) Just remember to keep your quotation marks in pairs and to start a new paragraph with each speaker. (This is one of the most important places to pay attention to those paragraphs.)

“BB-8’s not on fire.” Rey pointed to the Falcon.

“What’s left of him,” Poe shot back. 

“You know what you are? You’re difficult. You’re really difficult. You’re a difficult man.”

“You’re . . . You dropped a tree on him?” 

“You blew both sub-alternators?”

I kept a few tags at the beginning just to establish who was talking. Then I let the dialogue speak for itself.

Interruptions

Ah, interruptions. Life is full of them. So is writing. Fred or Mary or whoever is just trying to tell someone about this milkshake they had and THE WHOLE WORLD EXPLODES. 

Maybe not. Maybe a sound distracts them. Or someone else cuts into the conversation. Or maybe there actually is an explosion. 

When those interruptions arise, call up everything we just learned about em dashes. 

Here’s an example where someone else interrupts. 

“Maui, shape-shifter, demigod of the wind of sea, I am Moana–”

“Hero of men.”

Or if it’s that aforementioned explosion:

“As I was saying, I had this milkshake yesterday–”

Boom! An explosion shook the ground. 

Whatever the interruption is, it normally gets a new paragraph too. This helps your brain make the break and realize something new and probably unexpected is happening.

Internal Dialogue

Characters don’t always have to have other people to talk to. They often talk to themselves. I do all the time. 

Ahem. 

Because we’re seeing the whole story through a character’s eyes, naturally we’re going to get a lot of their thought processes–aka internal dialogue–along with that. 

In the olden days (actually not so long ago), it was the thing to put all those lovely thoughts in italics, like I’ve been doing with every quote in this article. 

But people aren’t so huge on that anymore. (Myself included.) If we’re already in the character’s point of view, why should we need italics to know it’s them thinking? It jerks people right out of the story. 

But some people still want to know exactly where those thoughts are. 

If that’s you, here’s how you punctuate it. 

In most cases, you simply italicize whatever the thought is, and that’s that. 

I wonder what’s for dinner today. 

Please don’t put quotation marks around your thoughts, because if italics don’t jerk your reader out of your story, trust me, that will. 

Still undecided on italicizing or un-italicizing? Here’s the same thought presented both in italics and without italics. Which one flows better for you? 

Italics: I wonder what’s for dinner today. Spaghetti would be nice. 

No italics: What was for dinner today? Spaghetti would be nice.

Conclusion:

Whew! We made it. And I only yawned twice. I think.

Hopefully, now you have a handy guide to refer back to in those nasty punctuation predicaments. So go write some brilliant dialogue—because now that you know the rules, nothing’s going to dim its sparkle.

*What’s the hardest punctuation problem for you? Let me know in the comments below!*