No quotation marks!

[Jada59]

I finished another book that was left over from my daughter's school days. I don't think it was a true story although it was presented as such.

Most of the book claimed to be entries from a diary and were written as such. The zuthor wrote in slang such as "I was all...", "He was like...". But nowhere in the book were there any quotation marks when the people were speaking! I suppose I could forgive the lack of quotation marks in the diary section as diaries are composed of a collection of thoughts at the end of the day.

But the book doesn't start out with the diary entries. It works up to that, including the birthday party where the author received the diary as a gift.

I noticed the lack of quotation marks in the first paragraph and assumed it was an oversight. But. no!

Wow! That book was sooo hard to read. I wound up having to skim it.

I don't ever want to read a book like that again and I'm surprised that it even got published!

 

[Handley_Page]

There is, or maybe was, a story on the board called "Astronomy 01" by LadySapho69,
where the text is similarly bereft quotation marks.
As much of the story is folks talking, it is Very Difficult to read.

I do hope hat this junk is not a trend in Literature.

Come to think of it,
I suspect that the modern mobile (cell) phone may have a lot to do with it.

 

[Jada59]

There is, or maybe was, a story on the board called "Astronomy 01" by LadySapho69,
where the text is similarly bereft quotation marks.
As much of the story is folks talking, it is Very Difficult to read.

I do hope hat this junk is not a trend in Literature.

Come to think of it,
I suspect that the modern mobile (cell) phone may have a lot to do with it.

I hope it's not a trend too! I looked the book up on Amazon to see the reviews. It got mostly good reviews. The poor reviews said it was a rip off of an older book by another author, but they made it try to sound more current using slang. They also said the plot was not plausible. Oddly enough, no mention of the missing punctuation.

 

[SimonDoom]

Some authors dispense with quotation marks as a matter of style. Cormac McCarthy is like that. He uses no quotation marks because he thinks they clutter up the page and interfere with the reader's experience. He also never uses semicolons, seldom uses colons, and uses commas sparingly. If you read enough of him you kind of get used to it after a while, but I think he's basically wrong. Getting rid of quotation marks makes a story harder to read and slows things down.

 

[Jada59]

Some authors dispense with quotation marks as a matter of style. Cormac McCarthy is like that. He uses no quotation marks because he thinks they clutter up the page and interfere with the reader's experience. He also never uses semicolons, seldom uses colons, and uses commas sparingly. If you read enough of him you kind of get used to it after a while, but I think he's basically wrong. Getting rid of quotation marks makes a story harder to read and slows things down.

That's what I thought too.

 

[lovecraft68]

Some authors dispense with quotation marks as a matter of style. Cormac McCarthy is like that. He uses no quotation marks because he thinks they clutter up the page and interfere with the reader's experience. He also never uses semicolons, seldom uses colons, and uses commas sparingly. If you read enough of him you kind of get used to it after a while, but I think he's basically wrong. Getting rid of quotation marks makes a story harder to read and slows things down.

In other words he's probably like me and sucks at grammar, but has decided not to keep trying and claim it's a style.

 

[saintbibiana]

ireallydontseewhatallthefussisaboutpunctuaionjustslowseverythingdownandtheworldmovesprettyfastitshardtokeepup

 

[KeithD]

I've read an occasional book without quote marks for dialogue and have been able to adjust, although I have found it unnecessarily irritating and have written the author off as an "it's all about me" author. I've worked in publishing houses and we categorize authors there. An "it's all about me" author has to be awfully good at generating profit for the publishing house to be kept on the publishing list. But some publishing houses are letting this happen, yes.

I'm seeing a lot of UK publishing houses (and a few U.S. ones) using single quotes for dialogue as well. That too can be read once it's established, but it's a slight irritation. It's just been tolerated for longer than the no quotation marks approach has been and probably has a rationale behind it in the British style system.

 

[jehoram]

My philosophy is to always make it easier on the reader. After all, some people are good readers but others have trouble with the written word, so I try to give them the help they need.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Punctuation is like road lines, traffic lights, and street signs. Useful to have if you want to give your passengers a smooth ride.

 

[Emirus]

I’ve never read anything without punctuation and never would. When I’m thinking about buying a book I always look to see the type and size of the printed word to see if it’s what I prefer so I think it’s unlikely I’ll ever buy something without punctuation by mistake.

 

[Ninjasr4real]

Punctuation

I recently attended a cultural awareness training that brought to life why use of punctuation is falling off. It is coming from texting and is considered rude to the younger generation. A period, for instance insinuates finality of a conversation and is insulting. I am a cyber bully and didn’t know it, sigh.