Formatting dialogue correctly can trip up even the most talented writer. From the outside it can appear that formatting dialogue is a black box of contradictory rules. In this article I want to dispel this myth and detail a set of easy-to-use guidelines that will allow you to grasp the basic building blocks of dialogue formatting.
The best way to explain the rules of formatting dialogue is to use an example. In this article we will follow the steps that are required to format the following section of dialogue:
Hi have you seen my cat said Bob. No said Bill I have no idea where your cat is. If you see my cat will you let me know questioned Bob looking sad. Of course replied Bill with a tone of concern.
Formatting Dialogue: New speaker, new line
This is a pretty easy rule to apply. Each time a new speaker speaks you place the line of dialogue on a new line. This line should also be indented (assuming you are indenting new paragraphs). We can see how this applies to our example:
Hi have you seen my cat said Bob.
No said Bill I have no idea where your cat is.
If you see my cat will you let me know questioned Bob looking sad.
Of course replied Bill with a tone of concern.
Formatting Dialogue: Adding speech marks
Our next rule says that all speech should be placed in speech marks. These can be either single (‘) or double (“), it’s your choice. However, keep in mind that if you use, say single (‘), you need to be using the opposite, in this case double (“) when you are reporting speech inside speech. I also like to use the opposite when a writer places thoughts within a text.
‘Hi have you seen my cat’ said Bob.
‘No’ said Bill ‘I have no idea where your cat is.’
‘If you see my cat will you let me know’ questioned Bob looking sad.
‘Of course’ replied Bill with a tone of concern.
Formatting Dialogue: Punctuation
When writing dialogue you will often use ‘tags’. These are verbs that link the spoken words with the remainder of the sentence. Commonly used tags includes said, asked, replied and many more. Without going into the technical detail, to correctly punctuate spoken words and tags you must link them using a comma. If you use a full stop the sentences are broken and it no longer makes sense. If we look at the second line of our example we see:
‘No’ said Bill
This is a single sentence and therefore must end with a full stop, giving us:
‘No’ said Bill.
The tag in this sentence is ‘said’ and this must be connected to the speech. If you added a full stop at the end of the spoken words, it would separate the tag and become incorrect:
‘No.’ Said Bill. [WRONG]
Instead we must link the spoken word and the tag with a comma, this gives us:
‘No,’ said Bill. [CORRECT]
If we apply this to the full example we get:
‘Hi, have you seen my cat?’ said Bob.
‘No,’ said Bill. ‘I have no idea where your cat is.’
‘If you see my cat will you let me know?’ questioned Bob, looking sad.
‘Of course,’ replied Bill, with a tone of concern.
Please note that in the first and third lines we have used a ? instead of a , since it is a question.
Formatting Dialogue: The next step
This article has highlighted just the very basics of dialogue formatting. However, the aim is to give you just enough information to get it right most of the time. As with all writing rules there is some give and take in the system and sometimes the way you present speech in complex situations becomes a judgement call. I would suggest that, if you are looking for more information on the topic, you read this excellent blog post that takes the idea of dialogue formatting one step further.
By Gary Smailes - Co-founder at 
Leave A Reply (4 comments So Far)
Brian Clegg
226 days ago
‘Our next rule says that all speech should be placed in speech marks.
These can be either single (‘) or double (“), it’s your choice.’ – Technically, according to most style guides (and most publishers), single inverted commas are the standard in the UK and double inverted commas are the standard in the US.
When you then use inverted commas within the inverted commas, for example when someone quotes someone else (‘Did he really say “Happy Christmas,” I wonder,’ said Fred.) you use double in the UK and single in the US.
[Reply]
BubbleCow [Gary Smailes] Reply:
October 5th, 2011 at 3:11 pm
I 100% agree. However, our editors have noticed in the past year or so that many US writers are following UK rules and UK writers following US rules. The fact that many self-published writers are publishing, and more importantly, reading work from across the globe means that grammar rules are fluid at best.
In fact, to deal with this problem we use an approach we call ‘manuscript override’. This approach sees our editors outlining the correct methodology to writers, but giving the writers the option of maintaining their own style. This has proved a popular approach, though I feel the more pedantic reader may be shuffling in their chairs are they read this.
[Reply]
Frfr
43 days ago
i seriouslly understood nothin!! :p
[Reply]
Gary Smailes Reply:
April 5th, 2012 at 7:59 am
Nothin at all?
[Reply]