

If you need to edit quotes in your writing, keep the following in mind: Unless you have a good reason for preserving an error, though, it is usually better to fix it and put the correction in square brackets instead. The reader will then know that the spelling “delishus” comes from the quoted text, so it is not a transcription error. His writings were riddled with errors due to his addiction, which he described as “a terrible but delishus shame” (Smith 2017, p. Usually, to use “sic” like this, you would place it in square brackets: This is short for sic erat scriptum, which translates to “thus was it written.” In cases like these, you can use the Latin term “sic” to show that you’ve kept something non-standard from the original text. Marking Errors in Quotationsįinally, what if you don’t want to change an error in a quote? Or what if it contains something that looks like an error, such as an old-fashioned spelling? It is now clear what Smith is saying without having to include the first sentence, but the reader can also see where we have changed the quote. 31) says, “The first time I ate, I was in love.” As such, we could edit the second sentence so that it works by itself: But without the first sentence, it wouldn’t be clear what the “it” refers to. We might then want to quote the second sentence.

Thank you for subscribing to our newsletter! For example, imagine we found the following in a book:īlancmange is delicious. If you do any of these, use square brackets to show where you have changed the original text. Integrate quoted text into your own writing.You can edit quotes by changing or adding words in order to:

If you do not have a style guide, simply apply one type of ellipsis consistently.
#USING TEXT EDITOR ON MAC QUOTATIONS ARE NOT RIGHT HOW TO#
