Dialogue Tags

British vs American

British English maintains the logical structure of spoken dialogue and the containing sentence.

‘I promise’, she said, ‘to use magic only for good.’

Attribution

If it’s obvious who’s talking, don’t attribute the dialogue:

‘The magic word is abracadabra.’

If it’s less obvious, use pro-nouns:

‘The magic word is abracadabra,’ she said.

If that’s not clear enough, use a name:

‘The magic word is abracadabra,’ said Mary.

If you’ve repeated ‘said’ too many times, try to express the attribution with an action:

‘The magic word is abracadabra.’ Mary presented her forearms as if to show me that there was nothing up her sleeves.

Adverbs are usually rubbish. Resist!

Exclamation and Question Marks

In both British and American English, exclamation marks in dialogue are included within the inverted commas of direct speech.

Mary opened her mouth and screamed, ‘Help me punctuate!’

Note: In British English, both exclamation and question marks are strong enough to drop the full stop at the end of the sentence.

Mary opened her mouth and screamed, ‘Help me punctuate!’

When the terminal punctuation of the quoted material and that of the main sentence serve different functions of equal strength or importance, use both:

  • She had the nerve to ask ‘Why are you here?’!
  • Did he really shout ‘Stop thief!’?
  • Was it Cain or Abel who said, ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’?

Colons and Semicolons

Both go outside the quoted material.

  • Mary opened her mouth and screamed, ‘Help me punctuate!’; she didn’t swear.

Interrupted Speech

Commas go outside the quotation marks.

Respect the punctuation of the uninterrupted dialogue.

  • Sally is looking radiant today.
    • ‘Sally’, he said, ‘is looking radiant today.’
  • Sally, you’re looking radiant today.
    • ‘Sally,’ he said, ‘you’re looking radiant today.’