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English 102

Suggestions for Quoting Effectively

Do:

1. Use present tense verbs in your signal phrases. Make sure the verb is appropriate and specific.

Example: O’Connor describes the houses as “bulbous liver-colored monstrosities of a uniform ugliness though no two were alike” (206).

2. Provide context for your quotations. Remind readers which events, ideas, or circumstances may have prompted the quotation or led to it.

Example: When talking with the village priest, Mr. Obi tells him that “’The whole purpose of our school . . . is to eradicate just such beliefs as that’” (250).

3. Make sure that all pronoun references are clear. Whenever possible, shorten the directly quoted material by leaving the pronoun and including the antecedent (the noun that the pronoun refers to) in the introduction to the quote.

Example: Lyman worries about Henry, saying that Henry would “freeze himself to death working on that car” (378).

Example: After the war, Lyman misses the relationship he and his brother used to have, saying that “[Henry] was such a loner now that I didn’t know how to take it” (379).

4. It’s best to place the page citation as close as possible to the quotation, even if that means the citation comes before the end of your sentence.

Example: When Sykes is bitten by the snake, Delia hears “All the terror, all the horror, all the rage that man possibly could express” (151) from inside the house.

Don’t:

1. Include the page number or paragraph in your signal phrase.

Example: As the narrator says on page 195, “The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago.”

Correct: We learn that the lottery has changed a bit over time, as “the original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago” (195).

2. Drop a quotation into the middle of a paragraph without using a signal phrase or blending the quotation into your own sentence.

Example: Julian does not seem to respect his mother or her ideas. “Everything that gave her pleasure was small and depressed him” (206).

Correct: Julian’s disrespect for his mother is evidenced by the fact that “Everything that gave her pleasure was small and depressed him” (206).