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Ending a sentence with a partial quote

Ending a sentence with a partial quote

Ending a sentence with a partial quote

(OP)
What is the correct terminal punctuation for a sentence that ends with an partial quote, as indicated with an ellipsis?

For example:

John Paul Jones said something about "Damn the torpedos..."

Bill Gates is not happy with the punctuation as presented above, nor with adding an additional period after the quote (my preference).

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

I have actually taken the time to look up the punctuation following quotes.  In this case, a period after the quotes is appropriate.

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

Yup, the period just ends *your* sentence, not JPJ's--you could substitute "red apples" (not in quotes) for the whole quote, and the period would clearly belong there.

Bill Gates and his green marks aren't very reliable. His red marks are okay. It is very, very rare that I find one of the green grammar marks in Word to be of merit. I have no idea if there are any better grammar checkers out there.

Hg

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

(OP)
MadMango's first reference suggests adding a forth period after the ellipsis, inside the quotattion mark.  The sytle manual in the back of my Random House dictionary suggests the same.

Another possibility allowed by the Webster site is a partial quotation where you stop at the end of a sentence, but omit following sentences of the quote.  In that case Webster suggests the period to finish the sentence, then the ellipsis.  Again resulting in four dots.

Tick,  please cite your source.

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

The fourth period goes inside the quote marks only in the U.S. where we have an illogical (but fortunately fading) rule that periods and commas always go inside quote marks, regardless of context (an artifact of old typesetting technology). On the other side of the Atlantic they are much more sensible and the period only goes inside quote marks if it's part of the quote, so in this case it would go outside.

There are already some U.S. stylesheets that have gone over to the British way but I forget which ones. I can find out, if anyone really cares.

Hg

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

(OP)
HgTX,

Since you were so kind as to offer, please do find out.  I don't know that I really care, but I am interested.

Even though I am a West of the Atlantic native, I have always preferred the Brit's way of dealing with quotes at the end of a sentence.  Makes much more sense.  The period that ends the sentence goes at the end of the sentence, period.

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

I have a terrible feeling that what I was thinking about with regard to evolving style guides may have been serial comma (before "and" in a list).  Bummer and sorry.  The best I can find now is debate about the American system, and references to such debate.  I can find a whole lot of references that say "American style does it this way and here's why it's stupid but do it anyway."  (Note period that is part of the quoted sentence.)

Certain fields (computer science and linguistics, to name two I've been directly involved with) go ahead and use the British system anyway because exact string references are important.   "TXT" is different from "TXT.".  (Note sentence-final period distinct from period that is part of quoted text string so as to clarfiy that the period in quotes is in fact part of the quoted material. That's kind of a weird case because the period in the quotes really isn't serving as a punctuation mark but just a symbol; even the Brits wouldn't ordinarily end a quoted sentence with a period inside the quotes and then put another one outside to end the main sentence.)  I found a Canadian style guide that recommends the American style for literary works and the British style for technical works:

http://www.writersblock.ca/tips/monthtip/tipmay96.htm

I don't think they're quite right in how they describe the British system, though.  I'm reasonably sure the Brits do what I did in the first paragraph--if the quoted material is a full sentence that merits a period of its own, the period goes inside the quotes.  I've found other sites that give examples that way:

http://www.eharlequin.com/cms/learntowrite/ltwArticle.jhtml?pageID=030512wg01001

Unless I've been explicitly ordered to use a particular style guide, I use the British style and no one bothers me about it.

'Nuff.
Hg

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

With respect to the Oxford comma, I prefer the American system.

With respect to the punctuation mark being inside the quote, I prefer the British method.  The reason that it was done that way originally no longer applies, so I opt for the more logical approach.

RE: Ending a sentence with a partial quote

(OP)
I was wondering how long it would take before someone caught that.

I started with:

Was it JPJ who said something about "Damn the torpedos..."?

However the example with a question mark at the end was not an example of the case I was questioning, so I cheated and just deleted "Was it" and "who".

I will admit to not remembering that the torpedo guy was Farragut.

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