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punctuation - Comma placement when using quotes that end with a question mark





How should I punctuate around quotes?



I've been writing a letter to an editor, and one line of my response reads:



In your article "What Makes Free Will Free?" you mention...



My question is: where should I place a comma to transition from the quoted article title to words you mention... after it? Should I place the comma in the quotes, or outside the quotes? Traditionally, I would place it in the quotes, but I wasn't too sure if I could place a comma right after a question mark like that.



Answer



The quotes here delimit the article title. Since the comma is not part of the title, it belongs outside of the quotes. If this were a book title, it would be either italicized or underlined, but the comma would not. The same logic should apply here.


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