Commas in Quotation Marks
Commas appear to be the bane of my existence these days, at least when judging contests. People do not use commas correctly.
Most of the mistakes I see are in dialogue.
If your character is addressing someone, that should be separated by a comma.
“Mal, I don’t think you should open that door.”
“I don’t know what to think, Bella!”
When using a tag with quotation marks, and the sentence is a statement (not a question or an exclamation), you punctuate with a comma.
“I’m tired of this. I’m going home,” Maddy said.
“So sorry I couldn’t be of more help,” Ben muttered.
When using the tag before the quotation marks, you separate with a comma.
Rolling his eyes at her, he added, “And then we can go home.”
These are the main boo-boos I see in judging contests. Most people know how to separate items in a list, but may insert a comma where it's not needed.
For example:
The dark, blue dress clung to her figure. No comma needed here because A) dark describes blue and B) you only need a comma with more than two adjectives. Can I think of an example at 1:30 AM? No, I cannot.
Also, there should be a comma between an introductory word (like also, or no ;) ) and the rest of the sentence.
Well, it's time for me to go to bed.
No, I won't be staying up this late anymore :(
What are some other comma abuses you see?
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7 comments:
I'm not a comma expert. In fact, I tend to be pretty conservative with them. Something I need to work on.
BUT... it DOES drive me a little batty when writers don't set a name off with a comma in dialogue.
mary, that vegas commercial that ends with...
"what happens in vegas, stays in vegas."
drives me nuts. it doesn't look right to me, but i assume it is.
I used to be a comma expert, BUT then I took Advanced Grammar. The language is a living, breathing thing and comma rules change. It will be interesting to see how much they change in the next few years as the techno generation takes over. :-) Interestingly enough, when we were at UT last year, the Liberal Arts counselor said big businesses have been actively recruiting English majors because the desperately need writers. Also, have you noticed how many proper commas are missing in books these days? It's so strange. I HATE getting comments back that are completely, totally incorrect. I sure hope the comma isn't going the way of cursive writing, but I did hear one grammar guru say in a few years the comma will be used simply for clarity and nothing else. ACK!
Jennifer, as far as I've seen, you're great with commas!
Dawn, technically you're right. The subject of the sentence is What happens in Vegas. Stays is the verb. You should never separate a subject and verb with a comma.
Mary Beth, aren't commas only used for clarity now? Separating phrases, lists, names? Hmmm.
Ugh, I’ve been reading engineering specification documents for two days, and whoever wrote it had NO idea what they were doing grammar-wise. My biggest comma pet peeves are now:
1) Not putting commas after opening phrases. Example:
"In general, the work should be completed in two hours."
(There should be a comma after general, right??)
2) Using commas in front of “which” or “that” when they aren’t needed. This example taken directly from my insurance agent’s website (more than commas are wrong with this sentence…):
“…my staff and I will assist you in determining the insurance and financial solutions, which best fits your needs.”
Hope all's well on San Antonio roads! I'm coming there tomorrow for the day to visit my good friend who just had a baby! :)
I HATE when commas are put between the subject and the verb. And much more egregiously than the Vegas example. Stuff like,
"Susan, sent the e-mail."
Sarah, technically, "which" is to be used with an independent clause, "that" with a dependent clause. Your example from the insurance web site should eliminate the comma and change "which" to "that" to be correct.
A correct example using "which" would be something like:
"I enjoy visiting Mary's blog, which always has insightful posts."
GAH, Sarah! That would drive me nuts, too!
Roads are clear today, all sunshine all day, thank God. One of the schools in my district was DESTROYED, and I got more terrible news today...one of the drowning victims was the son of a teacher I used to work with. 18 years old and swept away in a drainage ditch.
Natalie, love that example ;) Now, when to use "which" and "that" throws me.
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