Speech marks: single or double?

[Fizzytea]

Just arguing/chatting with DH, who is an academic. He says in British English we use single inverted commas for direct speech.

He says, 'we use single inverted commas!'

I say, "at school we were taught to use double!"

(DC10 says actually we should use a capital letter after the inverted comma/s also, but that's another discussion.)

I looked it up in my 1980s copy of Fowler's Modern English and it says to use single inverted commas. So why are we taught to use double at school?

Yes! So at what age do we have to switch to single...?!

Just when we start using Harvard referencing systems etc.?

But then I was taught two spaces after a full stop and apparently thats wrong as well so who knows.

Me too. And I refuse to change!

I was taught the exact same re speech marks and full stops (one space after a comma).

Longstanding, pernickety book-and-journal editor here.

I'm past caring. I check the publisher's style guide and if that doesn't care either, make a note of the author's main style and use that consistently.

Me too.

I rarely write "..." because I rarely write in this way. Frequently use '...' as I quote speech.

It’s double to quote. Used to be called speech marks back in the day

"This is confusing me all the more, because we were definitely taught at school to place punctuation within the speech marks!"
<deliberate use of double quote marks here to fuck off the traditionalists>

I think people get taught all sorts of weird shit as fact at school. And some teachers - like all other individuals - get the strangest bees in their bonnets. My A-level English teacher had an aversion to the word "verse" (unless in the context of "written in verse") and insisted that we use "stanza". Used to deduct marks if we used it. And just think of the people who were apparently taught that "Ms." is only to be used for divorced people.

You might have been taught to put direct speech within the quote marks by an exasperated teacher who just thought it was better to convey a simple message that would be remembered than a more differentiated one that confused the class. However, if you were in the UK I would very much doubt that you were taught to place the punctuation within quote marks in every case. Think about these "scare quotes" below (whether the inverted commas are double or single is irrelevant here - it's about the comma placement):

Consider what you were "taught," both at school and university, about grammar.

Consider what you were "taught", both at school and university, about grammar.

Would you really use the first version in British English? Because I've only ever seen that in American English, and most Brits seem to find it a crime against orthography.

Same! Glad some of us are hanging in there with that one

IIRC, which is not necessarily likely, the rule about punctuation within vs outside quotation marks (or brackets) is based on whether the punctuation kind of "applies" to the sentence within or outside. I'll try to think of some examples.

A shopping list: apples, bananas, oranges (only if easy peel), grapes and milk.

I wanted to write a shopping list (for my mother, who is stuck at home currently) so I looked in her cupboard to see what she already had.

In the first example, the addendum applies to the oranges so the comma should stay outside.

In the second case, if I'd omitted the brackets then I'd have put a second comma after "currently", but it looks more correct to me to just leave it out. I seem to recall that if you use some kind of punctuation at the end of a sentence-within-brackets, such as ! or ?, the word immediately following the bracket does not need a capital letter as it usually would, because the content inside the brackets doesn't influence it (or something).

But I do remember being taught to put a comma at the end of speech if there wasn't a full stop or other punctuation. Like so:

"Who's there?" asked Harry
"I didn't see anyone," replied Ron, who was busy cleaning his broomstick.

What people were taught decades ago and what is correct today aren't necessarily the same.

Things have changed as in more reading is now on screens, which didn't exist 30+ years ago.

Plus more awareness about accessibility meaning that a lot of style guides require text to be as uncluttered as possible, to make it as easy as possible to be read by people with visual/learning difficulties. Which would suggest that single quotes are correct.

No, I was taught at school to put grammar inside speech marks, but those things you're using there were called "inverted commas" and the grammar was kept outside those! :)

I’d introduce a direct quote with a colon, double speech mark, and a capital letter.

Charlie says: “Always tell your mother before you go off somewhere.”

Indirect I’d use singles. When asked about staying safe, Charlie said you should ‘always tell your mother…’.

I know the first is right, but I’m not sure about the second.

"No, I was taught at school to put grammar inside speech marks, but those things you're using there were called "inverted commas" and the grammar was kept outside those! :)"
I do think that the terminology has moved on a bit since then - what decade were you in school?
Looking at my copy of Hart's Rules (admittedly an edition from 2005, so not exactly at the cutting edge of language) the index doesn't mention speech marks at all, and for inverted commas it directs the reader to quotation marks instead. In other words, quotation marks is the term used for all such cases, whether single or double, and for direct speech, quotations, or scare quotes alike. Scare quotes are officially disapproved of, but they serve a pretty useful function.

It appears I’m officially both American and “old.” Who knew?

I’m a proofreader and I tend to accept anything as long as the writer is consistent. The amount that do “this,” one minute and ‘this,’ or ‘this’, the next - you wouldn’t believe it.

"I’d introduce a direct quote with a colon, double speech mark, and a capital letter."
Using a colon instead of a comma is much more common in American English. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's "wrong" in British - but some people might want to do so.

I'm utterly baffled that some people want to distinguish between direct speech and quoting material: after all they're both direct speech in the sense of the exact words a person has used. I've never come across that in the British or American style guides I use, as well as numerous style guides produced by publishers. Some traditionalists would certainly use single quote marks for scare quotes (the word "wrong" above is a scare quote) and keep double for direct speech and quotations, but even that is becoming less common these days.

This.

It's why up-to-date style guides are so important. When I'm editing client stuff more time is wasted trying to establish precedents by trawling old material than actually marking up the text. If they updated the style guide I could charge them less.

I'm also published myself by three different houses and they all use singles for me. Even the e-versions sold in the US have singles.

Quite a lot of my time is spent getting rid of quotation marks around perfectly well-known and accepted expressions. We don't need to worry about 'scaring the horses' by using expressions everyone knows without putting them in quotes. It's not a 'hill to die on'.

"I’m a proofreader and I tend to accept anything as long as the writer is consistent."
And that's ultimately the main consideration. Isn't it the Chicago Manual of Style that states the editor is welcome to disregard the guidelines in the book as long as they're consistent about it? I would add: as long as you're consistent and the publisher (or whoever is paying you) is on board with your approach.

It's a bugger with anthologies though: author A insists on single quote marks and author B will only consider double, and the publisher doesn't care as long as you're consistent throughout. It's so easy to end up as piggy in the middle with authorial egos flying around the manuscript - a dangerous place to be.

Children are taught double when they learn to read, so they don't confuse them with apostrophes. Double is used for younger kids' books and middle grade books. For older middle grade up to young adult and adult, single is generally preferred in UK English, but double is correct too. So there is no one right answer... (I'm an editor.)

I prefer single for everything (dialogue, scare quotes, quotations, etc.) as that looks neater and better.

@Tarkan
"'Then you get authors like Roddy Doyle and Irvine Welsh who use an em dash before speech instead of any inverted commas'"

What's an 'em dash '?

It's a long dash. Em dash is — there's the shorter one called the en dash which is – then a hyphen is - I'm on an iPhone right now and if you press and hold the hyphen key then you get the option of both dashes too.

This link is quite good with UK and US differences mentioned too although I've seen both em and en dashes used in British writing for adding extra information into a sentence—rather like this—although I also know people who just use commas for that too, too many commas within a sentence can get confusing though so the dashes help instead. As others have said about the UK/US speech marks/inverted commas difference, consistency is the more important thing, if you use one just keep using it, don't switch between them.

prowritingaid.com/art/2294/em-dash-vs-en-dash.aspx#head4

Oops apparently the em dash on MN turns text into a strikethrough. So ignore that bit, I didn't mean it to look like that!

This is from the National Curriculum:

Use of inverted commas and other punctuation to indicate direct
speech [for example, a comma after the reporting clause; end
punctuation within inverted commas: The conductor shouted, “Sit
down!”]

This is Roddy Doyle (Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha) then Irvine Welsh (Trainspotting)'s use of the em dashes for speech.

I read an interview with Irvine Welsh a couple of years ago where he said he liked Doyle's style so that's why he used them too but you can see the formatting is still slightly different with how they each use them.

Each dash is where you would have a new speech mark opening dialogue, but they don't use a dash at the end of the section of speech, but you will have stuff like "he said" at the end after a comma. Whenever someone else talks that's when you get a new line with a dash.