rionaleonhart | I Want To See The Zoo, She Said, I Want To See The Zoo.

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I Want To See The Zoo, She Said, I Want To See The Zoo.

WHILST I'M BEING INSECURE ABOUT MY WRITING: for as long as I can remember, I have used "double quotation marks" for speech in fiction and 'single quotation marks' for all other purposes. No style guide will recommend this: in British publishing convention, single quotes are used for all purposes, including speech, with speech within speech the only context in which double quotes are used; in American publishing convention, the situation is reversed. Does this inconsistency bother you? (Alternative question: do you have similar stylistic quirks?) I just think there's something quite nice about drawing a visual distinction between speaking and 'setting a phrase aside'. If there are two different types of quotation mark, why not put them to use?

Regarding Supernatural: I rewatched 'Fresh Blood' a little while ago, and it reminded me of how awesome Bela can be. I love that she actually seems surprised and a little upset that Dean is so angry with her for telling a murderous madman where to find them. HONESTLY, DEAN, YOU'RE SO OVERSENSITIVE. And then she helps them track him down, because, hey, she didn't know Dean was going to be so unreasonable about the whole thing. I love her.

HERE IS SOMETHING I WOULD LOVE TO SEE: a rewritten Twilight, with Bela in the role of Bella. Edward may be ridiculously strong and fast, but if he can't hear Bela's thoughts he's doomed. She will seduce him, use him shamelessly and then run off with his sister to form an amazing con artist duo. It would be pretty great. And at least Bela's unsympathetic aspects are intentional, unlike those of Bella 'Stupid Unattractive Humans With Their Stupid Being Nice To Me' Swan.

(Jo is welcome to join Bela and Alice in their con-artistry.)

(Also, Ruby can flit between the three of them, although I have not yet decided whether she would assist with the cons or whether she would ruin them for her own amusement by possessing the team members at inopportune moments.)

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THIS COULD POSSIBLY BE THE BEST CROSSOVER IDEA EVER.

Also, I pretty much do what you do re: double quotes and single quotes. I don't consider it an issue so much.

Deliberately compounding my thoughts on the matter this time. :P

True fact: I will not read a book (or a fic) if the speech is given in single quotation marks. It just peeves me. I do enjoy writing where the author has made a stylistic choice not to use any kind of quotation marks to signify speech, though.

I've always used double speech marks for speech, and single for other use. I never knew it was any different!

I am ashamed to say that I use quotation marks rather indiscriminately. Double ones for speech, always, but for any other purpose I switch between single, double, italics, underlining, bolding, blockquoting, capslock or no indication at all depending on mood. Which I'm sure annoys the piss out of people.

I was taught in primary school to use double marks for speech and only realised that it was seen as wrong a couple of years ago...

I always, always used single marks for speech and double marks for a quote etc within a sentence. Until fanfic. I got told by three betas in a row that it was terribly off-putting, and far too British, so I made myself make the switch to double marks for speech and now it looks really funny to me the original way round.

Yet another fandom intrusion into my life.

"I have used "double quotation marks" for speech in fiction and 'single quotation marks' for all other purposes. No style guide will recommend this: in British publishing convention, single quotes are used for all purposes, including speech, with speech within speech the only context in which double quotes are used; in American publishing convention, the situation is reversed. Does this inconsistency bother you?"

I do the same thing! I wonder if it's something I unconsciously picked up from fanfiction? Because I did it even in my first piece of English fanfiction, and I also did it in my first piece of Dutch fanfiction, which I wrote before I even really knew what fanfic was. Although I did read Savage Garden RPF on forums before I really knew what fanfic was, so maybe I picked up the double quotation mark thing for speech from that.

The adventures of Bela are a version of Twilight I would actually read!

That idea? Is golden. Now I want it so bad.

I use double for everything except for quotes within quotes/within dialogue, where I use single. Like: "Bob's claiming you got drunk and kept yelling 'I am not the walrus' all last night," Alice said, raising an eyebrow. "What's up with that, Fred?"

I have no idea if that's proper, but it works. I don't really notice different systems as long as they stay consistent and dialogue has something around it. My eyes aren't the best in the world, and I easily skip around/get lost without some kind of dialogue indicator (or at least italics).

My personal quirk is always typing two spaces after a period. Never mind it doesn't even show in HTML unless you do dirty things with non-breaking spaces, I...can't stand not to.

Oh, this has to be written! :D Hee hee. Right on about Bella, too. It really irritates me about her. I suppose she's meant to be viewed as a kind, good person. But a lot of the the time it just seems like she's too apathetic to bother being mean.

"double quotation marks" for speech in fiction and 'single quotation marks' for all other purposes.

YES, YES, THIS IS WHAT I DO. I was taught it at school and I will NEVER believe that single quotation marks should be used for speech.

I like the double quotation marks for regular speech; I feel it makes more of a distinction.

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I've always been in the same way as you with quotations. There is something that just screams speech with "" and other with ''. However, I never actually notice in fiction, and didn't even know that was how quotes were done.

Because I am slow.

i also use "these for speech or longer quotes in essays" and i use 'these for thoughts (at least i used to) and for single word/two word phrase quotes'. we are right, don't worry. the rest of the world is crap.

my stylistic quirks are mostly to do with in-text citation and reference lists, so i won't bore you with the details. however, i always double space after the end of a sentence (although the intert00bs tends to smoosh it back into one space).

I like your style. It's American-friendly.

I don't tend to notice single versus double, really. I notice the French style, but I can work with it. I'll only read stuff where speech is either not marked or marked in a a gimmicky style if it's clever and flows logically with the story (like "The Butcher Boy" where it's supposed to come off like the entire books one Giant Rambly Insane Monologue Of Doom).

I approve of Bela and Alice and Ruby, and even Jo (not enthusiastic about her, but I don't mind her). I also approve of Bela and Alice and Ruby and even Jo With Added Femmeslash.

I'm still trying to work out why Alice would meet the Top Gear Trio, although I'm convinced she'd drive Jeremy up the wall in a hilarious fashion (an attractive woman who likes Porsches and blurts out things like "No, I'm sorry, you're not going to get anywhere flirting with me. But don't worry, you'll be able to get into bed with your two friends as soon as you stop repressing and actually ask. I haven't got an exact timeline on that, so you may want to hurry things along by just asking now.")

I do exactly what you do - with the double and single quotes. I think it's a mixture between the American stuff I read on the internet and the British books I read coming together in a vaguely logical way. XD

Bella 'Stupid Unattractive Humans With Their Stupid Being Nice To Me' Swan That's her Indian name, yes.

I want to rewrite Twilight with Jeff and Neville as Edward and Bella, but I don't think I have the attention span for it.

As to writing quirks, I almost always stick commas and periods outside of single quotes ('like so'.) and I have no idea why. It's not grammatically correct, and it doesn't even look right, but I always do it. Maybe when I get published I'll make my editor leave it in, so that it's something that's mine and only mine alone. Another thing I do is use 'o' for '0'. (See? I did it there, too, without even meaning to.) That's intentional, because I did it as a typo once (they're right next to each other on the keyboard) and I thought it looked neat so I kept it.

And because I have to ask, where's your subject line from this time?

Does this inconsistency bother you?

Yes! I do not know why my country didn't go, "Oh, so that's the way we've been doing it? Great, let's do it the same way." But alas, it is the one I must use. (Also, I totally hadn't realized that was the accepted British format and now feel dumb. I've only seen it a few times... and actually I've known a few times that the people doing it weren't British — but anyway, I had no idea. SADFACE.)

Also, I probably over-use out-of-dialogue quotation marks like I overuse italics, which probably turns a lot of people away from my writing.

"I've always done speech like this." He said.

And thought like this. He thought.

With single quotes for certain... 'emphasis' on words, and for indirect quotes.

Except with using italics to quote chunks of stuff from posts on the internet when I'm going to be replying below.

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I think this is my only icon with a book in it, so it'll do for a comment about writing.

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