--- title: Direct speech: inverted commas and new speakers — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Direct speech: inverted commas and new speakers», a lesson of the english course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Direct speech is the exact words a character says, and inverted commas (also called speech marks) hug those words like a s --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [English](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/) / Direct speech: inverted commas and new… # Direct speech: inverted commas and new speakers Lesson 35 of the english course of Mova's primary school: 16 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/0/) — Direct speech is the exact words a character says, and inverted commas (also called speech marks) hug those words like a speech bubble in a comic: "Hello," said Sam. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/1/) — The punctuation that ends the spoken words goes inside the marks: a comma if the sentence carries on ("Hello," said Sam), a question mark for a question ("Where are you going?" asked Mum), an exclamation mark for a shout ("Look out!" shouted Tom). - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/2/) — Every time a new person speaks, start a new line, the way a play script gives each actor their own line; a whole conversation in one block is like everyone in class talking at once. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/3/) — Speech can be split in the middle: "If you're ready," said Mum, "we'll go." The second part starts with a small letter because it is still the same sentence. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/4/) — Inside the marks, characters talk their own way, dialect and slang included: "'Wee eejit,' said Da" (Belfast for "little idiot", said fondly) is perfectly punctuated, and it shows who Da is better than a description could. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/5/) — Direct speech is the exact words someone says; it goes inside inverted commas, also called speech marks. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/6/) — The punctuation that ends the spoken words goes inside the closing inverted commas. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/7/) — If the sentence continues after the speech, the spoken words end with a comma, not a full stop: "Hello," said Sam. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/8/) — Questions and exclamations in speech keep their ? or ! inside the marks: "Where are you going?" asked Mum. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/9/) — Start a new line (a new paragraph) for each new speaker. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/10/) — In split speech, commas go around the "said" part, and the second part starts with a small letter if it continues the same sentence. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/11/) — Indirect (reported) speech tells what someone said without their exact words and has no inverted commas: She said that she was tired. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/12/) — Both single ('...') and double ("...") inverted commas are correct; many UK books use single and US books double; be consistent. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/13/) — "Said" is often the best speech verb because readers hardly notice it; whispered, shouted or muttered add detail when used now and then. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/14/) — Dialect and slang can be written inside speech marks to show a character's voice. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/35-direct-speech-inverted-commas-and-new-speakers/15/) — In Manchester "our kid" means my brother or sister and "dead boss" means really great; in Belfast "Da" is Dad and an "eejit" is an idiot. - ← previous: [Apostrophes: missing letters and belonging](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/34-apostrophes-missing-letters-and-belonging/) - next →: [Brackets, dashes, colons, semicolons and hyphens](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/36-brackets-dashes-colons-semicolons-and-hyphens/) - ↑ back to [English](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/)