Jane said or said Jane

by Pauline George
21st March 2013

Hi

I'm new and to save trawling through a plethora of questions I thought I would ask this and apologise if it's a repeat.

When writing dialogue in a fiction novel should it be 'Jane said or said Jane'?

Many thanks

Pauline

Replies

It's a jungle out there, Jane,' said Tarzan.

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Adrian
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Adrian Sroka
21/03/2013

"Genre and period can often make a difference, too," said Pooh.

If you get my drift ;)

It'd be worth looking through other authors' work you'd consider in a similar vein to yours to see how they deal with it.

I almost always use '(Character) said' because (i) apparently it's least intrusive to readers and (ii) almost all the historical fiction writers I read seem to do the same.

In the end it's whichever you feel most comfortable with :)

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Jonathan
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Jonathan Hopkins
21/03/2013

thanks for that Ninette I agree I don't think it matters but I wanted to get another perspective on it.

I prefer 'I love it too,' said Jane so I may stick with that.

Pauline

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Pauline George
21/03/2013