A considerable time has elapsed since any major discussion on professional matters has taken place on the EATAW site. Bit now I am drowning in correspondence, much of which I would refer to as spam – but will not do so in case I offend somebody! I did make an attempt yesterday to divert the course of debate, with some success (thanks Linda). To be honest I am absolutely amazed that a professional organisation can become so entangled in a few comments which someone made when they have had a bad day. Do we honestly expect everybody to write a Shakespearean sonnet every time a question is asked, however mundane? – the question that is, not the sonnet, although ...

So to divert your minds (big and small), how would you punctuate the following as direct speech?

1. Go home he said and never come back.

2. Go home he said to your father.

 

Yes, this concerns placement of commas relative to the inverted commas indicating the direct speech.

We will all agree, I’m sure, that the final period, is included within the closing inverted commas.

Somewhere I read that the placement of the comma inside the inverted commas is a peculiarity of English, Therefore:

1. ‘Go home,’ he said, ‘and never come back.’

But for the second, New Hart’s Rules (p. 155) gives:

2. ‘Go home’, he said, ‘to your father.’

 

This seems logical in so far as there is no comma required in ‘ Go home to your father’. But I have had this ‘corrected’ by more than one editor. Do any of the EATAW members who have survived the storm have any comments? Where does US English stand on this matter?

John Taylor (who has had a good day, so far!)