Quotations can bring your writing to life.

The reader imagines someone is saying the words,

but quotations are also vexing to format.

Not only do you have to follow different rules

depending on what other punctuation marks

you mix with your quotation marks,

but people in different countries also follow different rules.

So you may see quotation marks

handled differently in high quality publications

from different countries.

And these aren't errors, they're just different styles.

First, let's review the easy but rare stuff.

Semicolans, colonns, and dashes always go outside

your closing quotation mark.

Here's some examples.

Bob snorted and said, quote,

I don't believe in zombies, unquote, dash

right before 30 of them emerged from the tunnel.

Her favorite song was quote,

Gungnam style, unquote, semicolon.

She spent weeks trying to learn the dance.

Gungnam style is in quotation marks

...