QUOTING A CONVERSATION IN A PLAY
INTER-TEXTUAL QUOTES IN A PLAY -- Pulled from MLA 7th ed. pp. 96-97
In general, essayists should refrain from quoting conversations. Choose the most important statements to quote and either paraphrase or quote the other interactions as narration.
But if you do plan to quote conversation from a play, set the quote up with some context followed by a colon. Then indent all of the lines. The names of the characters are in all caps followed by a period.
Additional lines belonging to the same speaker will have the tabbed indent and an additional indent that appears to be about 4 spaces. Notice in the examples below that the page numbers are not inside the punctuation.
EXAMPLE 1
Marguarite Duras’s screen play for Hiroshima mon amour suggests at the outset the profound difference between observation and experience:
HE. You saw nothing in Hiroshima. Nothing.
SHE. I saw everything. Everything. . . . The hospital, for instance, I saw it. I’m sure I did. There is
a hospital in Hiroshima. How could I help seeing it?
HE. You did not see the hospital in Hiroshima. You saw nothing in Hiroshima. (2505-06)
The ellipsis are explained below.
EXAMPLE 2
A short time later Lear loses the final symbol of his former power, the soldiers who make up his train:
Goneril. Hear me, my lord.
What need you five-and-twenty, ten or fice,
To follow in a house where twice so many
Have a command to tend you?
REGAN. What need one?
LEAR. O, reason not the need! (2.4.254-59)
The missing words in lines 254 and 258 are explained below.
EXPLANATION OF THE ELLIPSIS:
The ellipsis in EX.1 indicate that there is something missing (3 periods) and that there is an end to that sentence (a 4th period). When you have an ellipsis and a period together, the first period begins directly after the last word of that sentence. When the omitted text is inside the sentence rather than at the end, all 3 periods are surrounded by spaces.
Here is an example of internal ellipsis:
“Sunset swept by, then dusk, then dark and still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
“Sunset swept by . . . and still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
You could keep the comma after the word by if you would like. You decide what the ellipsis removes. Make sure the the punctuation still fits with the sentence as you have reduced it. If you chose to keep the comma, the sentence would look like this:
“Sunset swept by, . . . and still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
[Usually, you will need to ignore grammar check corrections when using ellipsis.]
To avoid using ellipsis, an essayist could do this:
“Sunset swept by,” and “still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
You do not need to eliminate all ellipsis use. But overuse of ellipsis and brackets makes an essay appear to be covered with boxes and dots.
EXPLANATION OF THE EXTRA SPACES:
The extra spaces in EX.2 match Shakespeare’s structure in his play King Lear. Because Shakespeare’s plays are actually extremely long poems, he writes with beats per line in mind. But people do not speak with set beats, so he will have one character begin or complete the number of beats together. In line 257, Goneril starts the beat count and her sister Regan finishes it in line 258.
In general, essayists should refrain from quoting conversations. Choose the most important statements to quote and either paraphrase or quote the other interactions as narration.
But if you do plan to quote conversation from a play, set the quote up with some context followed by a colon. Then indent all of the lines. The names of the characters are in all caps followed by a period.
Additional lines belonging to the same speaker will have the tabbed indent and an additional indent that appears to be about 4 spaces. Notice in the examples below that the page numbers are not inside the punctuation.
EXAMPLE 1
Marguarite Duras’s screen play for Hiroshima mon amour suggests at the outset the profound difference between observation and experience:
HE. You saw nothing in Hiroshima. Nothing.
SHE. I saw everything. Everything. . . . The hospital, for instance, I saw it. I’m sure I did. There is
a hospital in Hiroshima. How could I help seeing it?
HE. You did not see the hospital in Hiroshima. You saw nothing in Hiroshima. (2505-06)
The ellipsis are explained below.
EXAMPLE 2
A short time later Lear loses the final symbol of his former power, the soldiers who make up his train:
Goneril. Hear me, my lord.
What need you five-and-twenty, ten or fice,
To follow in a house where twice so many
Have a command to tend you?
REGAN. What need one?
LEAR. O, reason not the need! (2.4.254-59)
The missing words in lines 254 and 258 are explained below.
EXPLANATION OF THE ELLIPSIS:
The ellipsis in EX.1 indicate that there is something missing (3 periods) and that there is an end to that sentence (a 4th period). When you have an ellipsis and a period together, the first period begins directly after the last word of that sentence. When the omitted text is inside the sentence rather than at the end, all 3 periods are surrounded by spaces.
Here is an example of internal ellipsis:
“Sunset swept by, then dusk, then dark and still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
“Sunset swept by . . . and still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
You could keep the comma after the word by if you would like. You decide what the ellipsis removes. Make sure the the punctuation still fits with the sentence as you have reduced it. If you chose to keep the comma, the sentence would look like this:
“Sunset swept by, . . . and still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
[Usually, you will need to ignore grammar check corrections when using ellipsis.]
To avoid using ellipsis, an essayist could do this:
“Sunset swept by,” and “still the truck droned on, impersonally, uncaring” (25).
You do not need to eliminate all ellipsis use. But overuse of ellipsis and brackets makes an essay appear to be covered with boxes and dots.
EXPLANATION OF THE EXTRA SPACES:
The extra spaces in EX.2 match Shakespeare’s structure in his play King Lear. Because Shakespeare’s plays are actually extremely long poems, he writes with beats per line in mind. But people do not speak with set beats, so he will have one character begin or complete the number of beats together. In line 257, Goneril starts the beat count and her sister Regan finishes it in line 258.