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Internal Dialogue: Italics or Quotes?

Internal dialogue is used by authors to indicate what a character is thinking to himself/herself.

Direct internal dialogue refers to a character thinking the exact thoughts as written, often in the first person (I).

Example: “I lied,” Charles thought, “but maybe she will forgive me.”

Notice that quotation marks and other punctuation are used in the same way as if the character had spoken aloud.

You may also use italics without quotation marks for direct internal dialogue.

Example: I lied, Charles thought, but maybe she will forgive me.

Indirect internal dialogue refers to a character expressing a thought in third person and is not set off with either italics or quotation marks.

Example: Bev wondered why Charles would think that she would forgive him so easily.

The words she would tell us that she did not think these exact words.

Posted on Tuesday, June 10th, 2008 at 4:47 am

10 Comments

10 Responses to “Internal Dialogue: Italics or Quotes?”

  1. delaney says:
    December 8, 2010 at 2:39 pm

    what if you are telling the story and its past tense but then the internal dialoge becomes present tense of what you thought at that time? do you make a new paragragh everytime you use ihte internal dialoge as well?

    Reply
  2. leah says:
    January 27, 2011 at 12:35 pm

    What if I’m using italics but not using a proper pronoun (with no obvious capitalization), and my thought ends in punctuation other than a comma? Do I leave the pronoun lowercased, as I would if it were in quotes? Or do I capitalize it?

    For example, which would be correct (picture the thoughts in italics, if the HTML doesn’t process):

    What is that? she thought.

    or

    What is that? She thought.

    I can’t seem to find this type of example anywhere, and I’ve run into it several times with my historical fiction novel I’m writing! Thanks for your help!

    Reply
  3. Michelle says:
    April 3, 2011 at 8:24 am

    What about POV. In first person you would do neither, correct.

    Ex: I can’t believe he said that. What am I going to do now?

    Reply
    • Jane says:
      April 4, 2011 at 6:08 pm

      In the example you gave, you would not use italics or quotes. Other examples, also in a first person point-of-view, could use punctuation.

      “I can’t believe he said that,” I thought. “What am I going to do now?”

      I can’t believe he said that, I thought. What am I going to do now?

      Reply
  4. Duncan says:
    May 19, 2011 at 9:38 am

    I will concede either/or only insomuch that it may apply differently between MLA and novelization, but italics are still the acceptable form moreso than quotation marks, yes?

    Reply
    • Jane says:
      May 20, 2011 at 6:36 pm

      There seems to be quite a difference of opinion on this subject. According to The Chicago Manual of Style (13.41), “Thought, imagined dialogue, and other interior discourse may be enclosed in quotation marks or not, according to the context or the writer’s preference.” They do not even mention the use of italics. Also, AP Stylebook says, “So, is an unspoken thought always worthy of quotation marks? Writer’s choice on that.” I would not say that either one is more acceptable than the other.

      Reply
  5. bigsonny says:
    February 6, 2012 at 10:39 am

    So what if you’re writing from a 1st person POV. How do you distinguish between internal dialogue and simply giving an opinion.

    For instance:

    I looked around this scene and thought that everyone was caught in a suspended reality…

    vs.

    I thought “how creepy”

    vs

    My room was bare. I had always wondered what they said about me. Did I lack essence?

    How do I format each?

    Reply
    • Jane says:
      February 8, 2012 at 8:56 pm

      In your first sentence, the word that indicates that it is not actual internal dialogue. I looked around this scene and thought that everyone was caught in a suspended reality…

      If it was actual internal dialogue, the sentence would be written like this:
      I looked around this scene and thought, “everyone was caught in a suspended reality…” OR
      I looked around this scene and thought, everyone was caught in a suspended reality…

      Your second and third sentences are both examples of internal dialogue since they are the exact thoughts of the character.
      I thought, “how creepy.” OR I thought how creepy.
      “My room was bare,” I thought. “I had always wondered what they said about me. Did I lack essence?” OR
      My room was bare I thought. I had always wondered what they said about me. Did I lack essence?

      If they were not internal dialogue they would be written like this:
      I thought that it was creepy.
      I thought that my room was bare. I had always wondered what they said about me. Did I lack essence?

      Reply

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