See how she can help your writing business and help you edit your work. ‘Alice in Wonderland’ or ‘We Three Kings’ (for example). (iv)  Your posts will never be found in Google searches unless they’re properly optimised for your chosen keywords. Home » Blog » writing » How to Use Inverted Commas, Brackets and Capital Letters. My dad persisted for months (even though I expressed no interest) about me joining the armed forces. Use a capital letter to begin reporting a direct speech. Use a capital letter for abbreviations if they are also used for the full words. You must have seen these in newspapers, in … Use brackets to enclose a statement inserted into a sentence. See the writing tips page on this blog for more useful writing tutorials. If you’re a writer people expect you to pay attention to your writing. Email | are always enclosed within the inverted commas. When to use inverted commas or quotation marks. (iii) Ungrammatical sentences do not portray professionalism. A different way to write the above sentence is: The reason ‘Y’  in ‘yes’ is capitalised is because it starts the direct speech. In the three sections below, you’ll learn how to use these common punctuation marks and make your blog posts pop. Inverted Commas / Quotation Marks: Also known as speech marks or quotes, inverted commas could be a single or double mark-‘z’ or “z”. Get Updates via: 1. One school of thought says that double inverted commas (“they look like this”) should be used for direct speech, and the single ones (‘they look like this’) for quotations. One school of thought says that double inverted commas (“they look like this”) should be used for direct speech, and the single ones (‘they look like this’) for quotations. Anne Lyken-Garner – a YPP team member – is a published author, blogger and editor. In the UK, and some other countries, the single inverted comma is used (‘) to surround pieces of reported speech; in the US, and other places too, they double it up for extra security (“). to mark off a word or phrase that’s being discussed, or that’s being directly quoted from somewhere else. I don’t think it matters which one you follow, as long as you’re consistent throughout your writing so that your readers are clear about what you mean. 1. 2. Which ones you use is up to you. I think that I’ve now beaten this one to death, so we’ll move on. For example ‘FBI’ is always capitalised because if you write ‘Federal Bureau of Investigation’ you would need to use capital letters. This blog offers practical advice to help you become truly in charge of your writing career. 2. Some publishing houses, bloggers and writers believe the opposite. 22,176 Subscribers | They are used to enclose direct speech or a quotation. I was terrified the first time I read Stephen King’s ‘Misery’. Shrek’s question – including the question mark – is included within the inverted commas. Remember to stick with whatever (double or single inverted commas) you’ve chosen, so that your writing is consistent throughout.