Quotation Integration

Quotation Integration

Integrate quotations using either of the following methods:

1. Introducing the quotation with a colon;
2. Incorporating the quotation into the body of your own sentence.

If you introduce a quotation with a colon, you must, in the preceding sentence, explain to your reader the context of the quotation; e.g.:

• Under what circumstances it occurs in the text;
• In the case of dialogue, who is speaking and who is listening.

Be sure to clarify the quotation’s contribution to your argument.

If you incorporate a quotation into the body of your own sentence, the quoted passage, like the rest of your sentence, must follow the rules that govern sentence structure.  To determine whether it does so, perform this simple test:  remove the quotation marks and ask yourself whether the sentence, including the quotation, makes sense and is error-free.  Look, especially, for any of these common sentence errors:

• Sentence fragments,
• Comma splices,
• Run-on sentences.

If the quotation contains or introduces any of these errors, you need to fix them.

Prose:  Short Quotations

Three lines or fewer constitute a short quotation.  When you are quoting such a passage:

• Use a set of double quotation marks to indicate that you are using someone else’s words, and give the page reference in parentheses at the end of the sentence containing the quotation; e.g.:[unique_solution]
• Montresor leads Fortunato down “a long and winding staircase” in search of an imaginary cask of wine (187).
• If you are quoting a passage of dialogue, insert a single set of quotation marks within the double set to indicate speech; e.g.:
• Apparently, Montresor has stored the elusive wine in the furthest depths of his vault; at one point, he informs Fortunato that they are now “‘below the river’s bed’” (188).
• If your own sentence ends with the quoted passage, and the passage ends with a question mark or exclamation point, let the punctuation stand; e.g.:
• Montresor’s tone is both ironic and sincere when he offers his final farewell to Fortunato: “In pace requiescat!” (191)
• If your own sentence ends with the quoted passage, and the passage ends with a period, place the period after the parenthetical citation; e.g.:
• Fortunato is willing to risk his health in search of the wine; after all, as he assures Montresor: “‘I shall not die of a cough’” (187).
• If the quoted passage falls in the middle of your own sentence and ends with a punctuation mark that conflicts with the structure of your sentence, you may omit it or replace it with a comma, as needed; e.g.:
• Montresor warns Fortunato that “‘[t]he vaults are insufferably damp,’” but Fortunato insists on proceeding regardless (186).
• If you are quoting more than one passage in the same sentence, and the passages occur on different pages in your source, give both page references in the same parenthetical citation at the end; e.g.:
• Montresor informs us that Fortunato “had been drinking much” by the time he met him that night, which explains why Fortunato was “unsteady” on his feet while descending the staircase into the Montresor family vaults (185, 187).
• If you are quoting a passage that spans two pages, both pages, linked by a hyphen, need to appear in the parenthetical citation; e.g.:
• Wanting the house to himself for his evening’s project, Montresor had forbidden his servants from leaving the house in his absence, for “[t]hese orders were sufficient, [he] well knew, to insure their immediate disappearance [. . .] as soon as [his] back was turned” (186-187).

Prose:  Long, or Block, Quotations

Four lines or more constitute a long, or block, quotation.  When you are quoting such a passage:

• Do not use quotation marks unless they are already present in the original text. Indicate that you are using someone else’s words by indenting the entire passage twice and giving the page reference in parentheses at the end of the quotation; e.g.:

In speaking of his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured with superstition, made frequent allusion to the ancient popular notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise.  Not that she was ever serious upon this point – and I mention the matter at all for no better reason than that it happens, just now, to be remembered. (178)

• Use a double set of quotation marks to indicate speech in a block quotation; e.g.:

“These walls – are you going, gentlemen? – these walls are solidly put together;” and here, through the mere phrenzy of bravado, I rapped heavily, with a cane which I held in my hand, upon that very portion of the brick-work behind which stood the corpse of the wife of my bosom. (184)

Notice that, in long quotations, the final punctuation comes before the parenthetical citation rather than after; still, in terms of referencing pages, the same rules apply to both short and long quotations.

Verse:  Short Quotations

In terms of quotation marks and parenthetical citations, the rules are the same for poetry as for prose, except that, when citing a poem, you need to give the line numbers instead of the page numbers.  (If, however, the original text does not provide line numbers, then the page numbers are sufficient.)

The main difference between quoting verse and quoting prose is that, when quoting verse, you need to show your reader where each line begins and ends.  When the passage is short (three lines or fewer), you do this using virgules; e.g.:

• Recounting the events of the night when he first encountered the raven, Poe’s speaker recalls: “Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, / Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore – / While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping” (1-3).

Verse:  Long, or Block, Quotations

When the passage of verse that you’re quoting is long (four lines or more), don’t use virgules; simply reproduce the line lengths as they appear in your source; i.e., don’t keep typing till the end of the line, but hit return when the line of poetry ends in your source; e.g.:

• Hardy’s speaker evokes an ironically dreary setting for the thrush’s cheerful song:

The land’s sharp features seemed to be

The Century’s corpse outleant,

His crypt the cloudy canopy,

The wind his death-lament. (9-12)

Drama (Prose):  Single Speaker

• If the passage you are quoting represents a single speaker, you can treat it as you would a quotation of prose; e.g.:
• Following an unsuccessful evening out with Mitch, Blanche bitterly wonders: “Is that street-car named Desire still grinding along the tracks at this hour?” (85; Scene 6)
• The morning after Stanley’s assault on Stella, Blanche feels justified in sharing her honest opinion of him with her sister:

There’s even something – sub-human – something not quite to the stage of humanity yet!  Yes, something – ape-like about him, like one of those pictures I’ve seen in – anthropological studies!  Thousands and thousands of years have passed him right by, and there he is – Stanley Kowalski – survivor of the stone age! (72; Scene 4)

Note the format of the parenthetical reference:

• The page number appears first;
• A semicolon follows;
• The Act and / or Scene appears last.

Drama (Prose):  Two or More Speakers

• If you are quoting two or more speakers, begin the quotation on a separate line and indent, just as you would for a long quotation of prose, even if the passage contains three lines or fewer. The proper format appears below:
• Stanley is suspicious of Blanche from the moment he learns that the family property – and thus his wife’s inheritance – is gone:

STANLEY.  Now let’s have a gander at the bill of sale.

STELLA.  I haven’t seen any.

STANLEY.  She didn’t show you no papers, no deed of

sale or nothing like that, huh? (34; Scene 2)

Note that:

• The characters’ names appear before their speeches;
• The characters’ names appear in all caps;
• A period follows;
• Whether you are quoting one or more speakers, the parenthetical reference follows the same format.

Small Changes, Additions, and Deletions

As we’ve already seen, it is possible to make small changes and additions to quotations, as well as deletions of content that is irrelevant to your argument.  You must never make any changes that alter the sense of the quotation; however, as long the changes, additions, and deletions do not violate the writer’s intent, you can go ahead and make them – provided you use the appropriate punctuation.

Square Brackets:  [   ]

Use square brackets to indicate a small change or addition to a quoted passage.  Any change, even switching a letter from uppercase to lower or the reverse, must be signaled with square brackets.

• Square brackets can indicate that relevant information has been added to the quotation; e.g.:
• In Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” John Wesley unpatriotically declares that “‘Tennessee [his grandmother’s native state] is just a hillbilly dumping ground’” (165).
• They can also indicate that a change has been made in order to accommodate the grammar of your sentence; e.g.:
• The Misfit eulogizes the grandmother as follows: “‘She would [have] been a good woman [. . .] if [there] had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life’” (176).

Ellipsis Marks:  [. . .]

Use ellipsis marks to indicate omission of irrelevant information from a quotation; enclose them in square brackets to show that you have added them and are not reproducing ellipsis marks already present in the text.

• If you are omitting many lines of text, consider quoting twice instead of combining distant passages into a single quotation. Ellipsis marks are normally reserved for smaller omissions, such as the narrator’s voice in the middle of a passage of dialogue; e.g.:
• “‘Tennessee is just a hillbilly dumping ground [. . .] and Georgia is a lousy state too’” (165).
• You can also use ellipsis marks to shorten an unnecessarily lengthy passage; e.g.:
• In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Black Cat,” the narrator confesses that he hanged his cat “because [he] knew that in so doing [he] was committing [. . .] a deadly sin that would [. . .] place [his soul . . .] even beyond the reach [. . .] of the Most Merciful and Most Terrible God” (179).