On Sat, 5 Jan 2002, Clint Wolff (VAX collector) wrote:
> I don't understand why putting the period to the left of the quotation
> would be better than to the right... Please to explain...
The main purpose of the period is to denote the end of a declarative or
imperative sentence (i.e., a statement or an order). Within a quotation
lies another context, one which could be different from that of the
containing sentence. Having only one place to put punctuation creates
ambiguity, and putting the punctuation *inside* the quotation makes the
situation worse. For example, in "proper" American English:
Jamie asked, "Where are the toys?"
Now, which does this mean?
Jamie asked, "Where are the toys?".
Jamie asked, "Where are the toys?"?
In the first case, the author is stating that Jamie asked a question. In
the second, the author is asking if Jamie asked a question. These are two
very different meanings, and "proper" punctuation has no way to
distinguish between the two meanings. Here is a slightly more complicated
example:
Jamie said, "Jason said, 'What the hell!'"
Now, which does this mean?
Jamie said, "Jason said, 'What the hell!'.".
Jamie said, "Jason said, 'What the hell!'."?
Jamie said, "Jason said, 'What the hell!'?".
Jamie said, "Jason said, 'What the hell!'?"?
>From another viewpoint,
Jamie said, "Hello, world."
is quite like
printf("Hello, world);"
Personally, I use a writing style reminiscent of that described in the
Jargon File.
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/Hacker-Writing-Style.html
--
Jeffrey S. Sharp
jss_at_subatomix.com
Received on Sat Jan 05 2002 - 10:39:15 GMT