How to write a quote from a book

Q: Can you quote a line from a book?

Its perfectly okay to quote an excerpt of another authors work in your writing, but its not always okay to do so without permission. If you dont want to be sued for copyright infringement, its important to know when you need permission and when you dont. And thats not always obvious.

Q: How do you correctly write a quote?

Direct quotations involve incorporating another persons exact words into your own writing. Quotation marks always come in pairs. Do not open a quotation and fail to close it at the end of the quoted material. Capitalize the first letter of a direct quote when the quoted material is a complete sentence.

How you punctuate quoted dialogue from a novel will depend on what you are quoting and how you are quoting it. See the three most common considerations below.

Table of Contents Show

Quoting Dialogue and Text
Quoting Only Dialogue
Using Block Quotes
How do you address a quote from a book?
Can you quote a line from a book?
How do you correctly write a quote?
How do you put a quote from a book in an essay?

Quoting Dialogue and Text

If you are incorporating a quotation featuring both exposition and a character’s speech into your text, use double quotation marks around the quotation and single quotation marks around the character’s speech that is within the quotation:

Early in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Miss Baker, upon meeting Nick Carraway, makes the first reference in the novel to the title character: “‘You live in West Egg,’ she remarked contemptuously. ‘I know somebody there’” (11).

Quoting Only Dialogue

If you quote only the speech, use double quotation marks around it:

Early in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Miss Baker tells Nick Carraway that he must be familiar with someone she knows from West Egg: “You must know Gatsby” (11).

Using Block Quotes

When quoting dialogue from a novel, set the quotation off from your text as a block if each character’s speech starts on a new line in the source. Indent the extract half an inch from the left margin, as you would any block quotation. If a character’s speech runs onto a new line, as it does below, indent each line of dialogue an additional half an inch. Use double quotation marks around the spoken words:

Early in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, Miss Baker tells the narrator, Nick Carraway, that she knows someone from his town:
“You live in West Egg,” she remarked contemptuously. “I know somebody there.”
“I don’t know a single–”
“You must know Gatsby.”
“Gatsby?” demanded Daisy. “What Gatsby?” (11)

Work Cited
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. Scribner, 1953.

Here's how to use quote marks (or speech marks) according to publishing convention in your fiction writing. The guidance covers both US English and UK English conventions.

In this post, I cover the following:

What quote marks are used for
Omitting a closing quote mark in dialogue
Whether to use single or double quote marks
Whether to use straight or curly quote marks
Where the closing quote mark goes in relation to other punctuation
When not to use quote marks

What quote marks are used for
Quote marks are used in 3 ways in fiction:

Character dialogue
To distance the narrator from what's being reported
To denote song titles and other works

Character dialogue
Quote marks show that we’re reporting what someone else is saying or said.

Each new speaker's dialogue should appear on a new line and include opening and closing quote marks.

That puzzled me. ‘What do they need them for?’ I asked Hawthorne.
‘Latent footprints,’ he replied. ‘They need to eliminate you from the enquiry.’

The Word is Murder (p. 208), Anthony Horowitz, Arrow 2018

To distance the narrator from what's being reported
The tone of the distancing rendered by the quote marks will depend on narrative intent. Perhaps the voice is sarcastic. Or the author might want the reader to suspend belief by indicating that a character considers a word or phrase unreliable.

Imagine the character is saying so-called or supposed or allegedly before the word in quotes.

'What about your friends? Didn't they help?' Molly said.
Peter almost laughed. The last time his 'friends' had phoned or visited had been over six months ago. Two had wanted money, Another needed business advice. A fourth had spent the evening flirting with his now ex-wife.

A word of caution: Don't be tempted to differentiate distancing terms in the narrative from dialogue by using an alternate style. If there are double speech marks around the dialogue, there should be double marks around the distancing words.

NON-STANDARD (USING DOUBLES AS BASE STYLE)
"What about your friends? Didn't they help?" Molly said.
Peter almost laughed. The last time his 'friends' had phoned or visited had been over six months ago. Two had wanted money, Another needed business advice. A fourth had spent the evening flirting with his now ex-wife.

STANDARD (USING DOUBLES AS BASE STYLE)
"What about your friends? Didn't they help?" Molly said.
Peter almost laughed. The last time his "friends" had phoned or visited had been over six months ago. Two had wanted money, Another needed business advice. A fourth had spent the evening flirting with his now ex-wife.

To denote song titles and other works
Quote marks are also used to identify certain published works such as song titles and book chapter titles.

So, for example, if a writer is referring to an album or book title, this is rendered in italic. However, when it comes to a song on an album, or a chapter in a book, it's conventional to use quote marks.

Jamie pulled the vinyl from its sleeve. The White Album. His favourite. Well, 'Back in the USSR' anyway. He'd never admit it but he didn't much care for the other songs.

Omitting a closing quote mark in dialogue
There's one occasion where it's acceptable to omit the closing speech mark in dialogue: same speaker, new paragraph.

So, if you want your dialogue to take a new paragraph while retaining the current speaker, use a quotation mark at start of the new line but omit the closing one at the end of the previous paragraph.

‘[…] My father described the regular pom-pom-pom of the cannons and the increasingly high-pitched wails of the planes as they dived. He said he’d heard them every night since.
‘The last day of the battle he was standing on the bridge when they saw a plane emerging. […] Then he jumped overboard and was gone.’

The Bat (p. 251), Jo Nesbo, Vintage, 2013

Single versus double quote marks
There’s no rule, just convention.

There are lots of Englishes: US, UK, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand, South African, Indian, etc. Each has its own preferences and idiosyncrasies.

Focus on which English your audience will expect, and punctuate your writing accordingly.

Whichever style you choose, the main thing is be consistent.

In the UK, it’s more common to use single quote marks. And if there’s a quote within the quote, that’s a double. You might hear quotes within quotes called nested quotes.
In US English it’s conventional to use double quote marks with nested singles.

Ray studied his drink and narrowed his eyes. ‘You can be cruel sometimes, you know. I don’t know where you got it from. “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth …” Your mother didn’t have a cruel bone in her body.’

Sleeping in the Ground (p. 261), Peter Robinson, Hodder & Stoughton, 2017

“I had no idea why he was bringing that up now. So when I asked him he said, ‘Remember when the going got tough, who was there for you. Remember your old man was right there holding your hand. Always think of me trying to do the right thing, honey. Always. No matter what.’”

The Fix (p. 428), David Baldacci, Pan Books, 2017

If you choose double quote marks, use the correct symbol, not two singles.

Straight versus curly quote marks
Curly quote marks are more conventionally known as smart quotes.

It’s conventional in mainstream publishing to use smart or curly quotation marks, not unidirectional ones.

Changing straight quotes to smart quotes is one of the initial clean-up jobs an editor will carry out when they start work on a file. To prevent the problem occurring from the minute you begin typing:

Go to FILE and select OPTIONS
Select PROOFING, then click on the AUTOCORRECT OPTIONS button
Choose the AUTOFORMAT AS YOU TYPE tab
Make sure there’s a tick in the "STRAIGHT QUOTES" WITH “SMART QUOTES” box
Click on OK

If you’ve pasted material into your book from elsewhere, or you didn’t check autocorrect options before you began typing, there might be some rogue unidirectional marks in your file. To change them quickly, do a global find/replace:

Select CTRL+H on your keyboard to open FIND AND REPLACE
Type a quotation mark into the FIND WHAT box
Type the same quotation mark into the REPLACE WITH box
Click on the REPLACE ALL button

The closing quote mark in relation to other punctuation
In fiction, punctuation related to dialogue is placed similarly whether you're writing in US or UK style: within the quote marks.

Here are some examples:

"Don't move a muscle," Stephen said.
"My God! Is that Jonathan? He looks fabulous."
“Maybe you don't think we've met but I can assure—”
Dave glanced at the signature tattoo on the Matt’s hand. ‘That looks familiar. Who inked you?’
‘Never.’ I sized up the door and the window. ‘I love you ...'

However, there's a difference when it comes to distancing or cited works. Note the different placement of the commas and full stops in the US and UK examples. In US English, the commas come before the closing quotation marks; in UK English, they come after.

US English convention: Peter's "friends," the ones who hadn't bothered to find out if he was okay after his wife ditched him, seemed oddly keen to get in touch now that he'd won the lottery.
UK English convention: Peter's 'friends', the ones who hadn't bothered to find out if he was okay after his wife ditched him, seemed oddly keen to get in touch now that he'd won the lottery.

US English convention: "Favourite Jimi Hendrix songs? 'Foxy Lady,' 'Hey Joe,' and 'Purple Haze.'"
UK English convention: 'Favourite Jimi Hendrix songs? "Foxy Lady", "Hey Joe", and 'Purple Haze".'

When not to use quote marks
There are 2 issues to consider here:

Thoughts
Emphasis

Thoughts
CMOS at section 13.43 says you can use quote marks to indicate thought, imagined dialogue and other internal discourse if you want to. However, I recommend you don't. For one thing, I can’t remember the last time I saw this approach used in commercial fiction coming out of a mainstream publisher’s stable.

But the best reason for not putting thoughts in quote marks is because it might confuse your reader. The beauty of quote marks – or speech marks – is that they indicate speech. Let them do their job!

Emphasis
It can be tempting to use quote marks in your writing to draw attention to a word or phrase, but it’s rarely necessary and could even have the opposite effect to what you intended. It works instead as a distancing tool, as discussed above.

If you’re tempted to use quote marks for emphasis, imagine saying the sentence out loud, and making air quotes with your fingers as you speak. Would your character/narrator say it like that? If the answer's no, leave out the quote marks. Italic will work better. Or recast your dialogue so that the reader can work out where to place the stress themselves.

Summing up
If in doubt about how to use quote marks for your book, consult a style manual. I recommend the Chicago Manual of Style, the Penguin Guide to Punctuation and New Hart’s Rules, all of which offer industry-standard guidance.

Fancy listening instead?
If you'd prefer to listen to the advice offered here, Denise Cowle (a non-fiction editor) and I chat about how to use quote marks in all types of writing on The Editing Podcast. You can listen right here or via Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite podcast platform

How do you address a quote from a book?

Use an introductory phrase naming the source, followed by a comma to quote a critic or researcher. Note that the first letter after the quotation marks should be upper case. According to MLA guidelines, if you change the case of a letter from the original, you must indicate this with brackets.

Can you quote a line from a book?

It's perfectly okay to quote an excerpt of another author's work in your writing, but it's not always okay to do so without permission. If you don't want to be sued for copyright infringement, it's important to know when you need permission and when you don't. And that's not always obvious.

How do you correctly write a quote?

Direct quotations involve incorporating another person's exact words into your own writing. Quotation marks always come in pairs. Do not open a quotation and fail to close it at the end of the quoted material. Capitalize the first letter of a direct quote when the quoted material is a complete sentence.