Direct speech. Punctuation in direct speech

In Russian, any "foreign" speech, expressed verbatim and included in the author's text, is called direct. In conversation, she stands out with pauses and intonation. And the letter can be highlighted in two ways: in one line "in the selection" or writing each line from the paragraph. Direct speech, punctuation marks for its correct registration is a rather difficult topic for children. Therefore, when studying one rule is not enough, there must be clear examples of writing such proposals.

How to highlight a conversation on a letter

A direct speech "dialogue", punctuation marks and writing conversations on a letter is quite a complicated topic, in which you need to figure out how. First, replicas belonging to different persons, most often written from the paragraph. For example:

"And look in that nest: is there anything there?"

- There is nothing. Not a single testicle!

"Are there any shells around the nest?"

"There are no shells!"

- What!? Not really a beast that used to steal eggs - it's necessary to trace it!

This is a two-person dialogue , designed using a paragraph selection, in which every new paragraph with a replica of one of the interlocutors should always begin with a dash and with a capital letter. Replicas may thus consist of one or more sentences of a narrative, exclamatory or interrogative type.

Secondly, a direct speech, punctuation marks after which are put in a special order, can be written in one line. For such a registration of the dialogue "in the selection" without specifying to whom exactly they belong, each of them must be enclosed in quotation marks and selected using a dash. For example:

"Well, what about you?" - "I'm afraid, what if the staircase falls?" - "The ladder will not fall, but you can drop a basket with eggs!"

In the event that after one of the statements follows the author's notes, the dash before the next sentence is omitted. And before the words of the author put a comma and a dash.

"She's asleep," Tanya said. "Where you sleep, show it!".

Direct speech before and after the author's text

If, however, several words are included in the spelling of the conversation, the author's words precede the words, then a colon is placed after them. And it is necessary and in those cases when there is no verb that determines the continuation of the conversation, but a direct speech is clearly visible. For example:

Mother smiled:

"You are my clever girl!"

Also this phrase can be written in one line, only then you need to use quotation marks: For example:

Mother smiled: "My you are clever!"

It is worth noting that the unspoken thoughts or inner speech of the author is always allocated with quotation marks, regardless of where in the sentence it is located. Also on the letter in quotes take the sounds of echo. For example:

"Now I'd have hot tea," he thought.

I stand and think: "And why this rain?".

"Aw, people?" - echoed loudly.

The voice of the announcer sounded clear and loud: "Attention, attention!".

Before you write the words of direct speech, after the author's words always put a colon and open the quotes. The cue always starts with a capital letter, before the closing of the quotes put an exclamation or question marks, and the point only after the quotes.

Special cases of direct speech

There are some cases where after the author's words there is a direct speech, punctuation marks at which slightly differ from the above. Namely, if in the absence of the verb denoting the subsequent replica, it is impossible to put the words "and said", "and thought," and "exclaimed", "asked" and the like, in such cases the colon after the author's notes is not put. For example:

Nobody wanted to leave.

"Tell us another story!"

My words all confused.

"So you do not trust us?"

How to highlight a letter in a letter

Approximately by the same rules, the citations given in the text are also highlighted. If it is not given in its entirety, then in the place where the words are missed, they put the ellipsis. As a rule, citations are always marked with commas, even if they are similar to indirect speech. Before the author's speech, the quote with the first words omitted starts to be written with dots and with a capital letter, if it is located in the middle of the sentence, then with the lower case. Here, as in the case of direct speech, colons and dashes are used, which have according to already known rules regarding the location of the quote.

Author's notes in a direct speech

In the case where the text in the direct speech need to insert the author's words, then the statements are enclosed in quotes along with the author's notes. For example:

"I'll go to my grandmother - said the baby - and that's it!"

There are times when quotes are not put at all, commas are used instead:

• If there is no clear designation of the person to whom the replica belongs, or when the well-known proverb is used in the text.
• When it is difficult to determine before us a direct or indirect speech.
• If the word "speaks" is included in the statement. For example: I, I tell you, will show you !.
• If the statement contains the source. Most often this refers to the periodical press. For example: Speech from the stage, the correspondent notes, blew up the hall with applause.

If, at the break of statements, the direct speech should not end with any sign, or a comma, a dash, a colon or a semicolon, then before the author's words put a comma and a dash, and in the end a dot and a dash. Then the remainder of the replica is written with a capital letter. For example:

"I'll be out for a few minutes," said Lenochka. - I'll be there soon. "

In cases where in the first part of a direct speech before the break there was to be a question mark or an exclamation mark, then they put it in front of a dash and author's words, after which they put a point and continue direct speech after the dash. Also an ellipsis with a colon is stored.

Instead of concluding

Direct speech, punctuation marks which are not so difficult to learn, in literary works is very common. Therefore, books can be a good visual aid for studying this topic. After all, visual perception, together with the knowledge of the rules, can well fix the knowledge on the topic "Direct speech" in memory.

Punctuation marks, schemes of sentences with the arrangement of direct speech and citations in the text are studied at school for a single year, which is understandable, because this section of the Russian language is quite voluminous and has many subtleties. However, the basic rules that are most often used in writing are not that hard to remember.