History 406

First, all quotations should have a visible indicator that they are quotations, in other words, something that indicates to your readers that they are reading someone else's words, not your own.

In most cases, that indicator is -- not surprisingly -- quotation marks. They should always be double ones, (" ") unless there is a quotation within a quotation, in which case, single quotation marks are used for the middle quotation (' '), and, if there is a quotation within a quotation within a quotation, doubled marks (" ") are used again, and so on.

It is not enough to refer to the author of the quotation somewhere in the sentence. While that is usually a good practice, you must also put quotation marks around the words you are quoting. And it is not enough to refer to the source of your quotation in a foot- or endnote, since that is also the format for giving credit to information or ideas in your own words.

For example:

The original text reads (taken from Eva Keuls' The Reign of the Phallus, page 198):

Aspasia, by all accounts, was an exceptional person, but it appears that she acquired her fame or notoriety more by intelligence, and the protection of Socrates, than by sex appeal and womanly wiles. Plutarch, in his Life of Pericles (24), says nothing about her physical attractions, but only that Pericles esteemed her because of her "political insight." (Nevertheless, Plutarch reports, the ruler held her in "erotic attraction.")

My passage, quoting two key phrases from the original, reads:

Eva Keuls suggests that the relationship between Pericles and Aspasia was based not so much on "her physical attractions," although she notes that Plutarch said that "the ruler held her in 'erotic affection.'"1

There is one exception to this rule-of-thumb. If the quotation you are using is more than three or four lines of your text, you should separate it out from the main body of your text (which should be double-spaced) by single-spacing it and indenting it on the left side about an inch. In such cases, you do not use quotation marks, since the unusual format shows that it is a quotation.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage, quoting a block of three lines of the original, reads:

Eva Keuls suggests that the relationship between Pericles and Aspasia was unique:

The second rule of thumb is this: any quotations you use should always fit into the sentences in your writing.

There are a number of ways to do this. One of the most common is to add a phrase in front of the quotation, making the author's actions the main verb for the sentence.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage reads:

Eva Keuls notes that "Aspasia, by all accounts, was an exceptional person."1

Or:

According to Eva Keuls, "Aspasia, by all accounts, was an exceptional person."1

Or:

Eva Keuls writes: "Aspasia, by all accounts, was an exceptional person."1

Notice the differences in the punctuation immediately preceding the quotation in each of the above examples, depending on whether the quotation immediately follows the word "that" (no punctuation), or a dependent clause (a comma) or a verb (a colon).

Another way to make quotations part of your sentences is to quote only the most important phrases from the quotation, in a mixture of paraphrasing and quotation.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage, quoting two key phrases from the original, reads:

Aspasia was "an exceptional person," according to Eva Keuls, and one who "acquired her fame or notoriety more by intelligence" than physical appeal.1

A third way to make quotations part of your sentences is to use ellipses, the series of dots, that show that you are omitting part of the original sentence, so as to get to your point more quickly or make the quotation fit your sentence.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage, using an abbreviated quotation, reads:

Eva Keuls argues that "Aspasia . . . was an exceptional person."1

Keep in mind that the proper format for ellipses is the following: space, dot, space, dot, space, dot, space.

Note that if your use of elipses means that you need some additional punctuation to make your sentence flow smoothly, the Chicago Style allows you to add punctuation before you begin the elipses. So you might use a comma or a semi-colon followed by the ellipses, or even a period (in which case, there would be four dots, each followed by a space).

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage reads (note the differences in the two sets of elipses):

Eva Keuls, basing her comments on Plutarch, says of Aspasia that "she acquired her fame and notoriety more by intelligence . . . than by sex appeal and womanly wiles. . . . Nevertheless, . . . the ruler held her in 'erotic attraction.'"1

Note also that in the Chicago Style, it is not necessary to use ellipses at the beginning or end of your quotations, even if it is not the beginning or end of the original sentence. Remember, the quotation must become part of YOUR sentences. You are also permitted to change the capitalization of the first letter of the quotation (from upper- to lower-case or vice versa) and you are permitted to change the punctuation at the end of the quotation, adding or subtracting as necessary. This is different than in others styles, but you do not need to do things like: ". . . she acquired her fame . . ." or "[S]he acquired her fame . . ." Again, you can change the capitalization at the start of quotations, as you need to, and you can add or subtract punctuation from the end of quotations, as you need to.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage, quoting bits and pieces of the original, reads:

"She acquired her fame or notoriety more by intelligence . . . than by sex appeal," Eva Keuls says of the ancient Athenian prostitute known as Aspasia, but that "nevertheless . . . the ruler held her in 'erotic attraction.'"1

Note that in the above quotation, I have capitalized the S of "she," added a comma after "appeal," and changed the capital N in "Nevertheless" to lower-case without any indication of these changes other than they are all at the start or end of my quotations.

Likewise, if you need to add a word or two to clarify the meaning of a quotation, or to make a quotation fit into your sentence more smoothly, you are permitted to do so, but must put your words inside of square brackets.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage, adding my own words for clarity, reads:

Eva Keuls notes that "Aspasia . . . was an exceptional person [and] . . . that she acquired her fame or notoriety more by intelligence . . . than by sex appeal and womanly wiles."1

You are even permitted to change the form of some words within quotations, if it is the only way to get them to fit into your sentences, but again, you must put the changed word or words within square brackets.

For example:

The original text reads:

My passage, changing the form of "was" for the sake of sentence flow in my quotation, reads:

Eva Keuls notes that "Aspasia, by all accounts, [being] an exceptional person" was able to attract Pericles by means of her intelligence.1

Here, the word "was" is changed to "being," both forms of the same verb, "to be."

So remember, keep the two rules-of-thumb in mind: 1) all quotations must have a visible marker to show that they are someone else's words, either quotation marks or indenting and single-spacing, and 2) all quotations must fit into YOUR sentence structure, by quoting only phrases or by using ellipses or square brackets.

And as a famous person once said about quotations, "Good luck!"