how to indent dialogue in essay

How to Format Dialogue

by Beasley Nester | Feb 17, 2021 | Creative Writing

If you’re writing a novel, short story, or personal essay, then you need to know how to format dialogue properly. Even for writers with a knack for good grammar, formatting dialogue can prove challenging because there are many elements to consider. Below is a quick and simple guide to formatting dialogue along with examples. We’ll go into greater detail and more examples in another lesson.

What is Dialogue?

Dialogue is anything the people or characters actually say in your writing. You should use dialogue whenever you’re wanting to indicate that someone is speaking in your story, personal essay, or novel. In creative writing, there are many ways to allude to something a person or fictional character said, but we’ll only cover the basics here: Anything that shows between quotations “ ”. If you want to help the reader feel fully engaged and immersed in your writing, adding dialogue often makes this possible.

Rules to Format Dialogue

• Use Quotation Marks. Anytime someone speakers in your writing, you should surround those sentences in quotation marks. This doesn’t include internal thoughts, which may use italics or nothing at all. Opening and closing quotation marks are probably the most important part of dialogue. It allows a reader to know when someone speaks.

Without quotation marks, you’ll leave your reader frustrated and wondering if someone is speaking in a scene or if it’s the narrator talking.

“ How are those pomegranates coming along? ”

• Indent each new line of dialogue. The same way you indent a new paragraph because it helps the reader understand that you’ve moved on to a new idea, you should also indent each new line of dialogue by half an inch by pressing the tab key.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Mike said. “Well,” Kim said, “it’s not your problem.”

The indentation signals to the reader that you’ve moved on to another character who’s speaking.

• Use dialogue tags. A dialogue tag simply let’s the reader know which person or character is speaking each line. He said , she said , Jack said , are all considered dialogue tags. If two characters are having a long conversation down an entire page, it’s okay to skip a line here and there, as long as the reader understands which character is up next.

            “This is not what we talked about,” Jim said.             “I know,” Lynn said.             “Then why are we doing it?”             “Because it’s better.”             “Better than what?” Jim said.             “Better than getting fired,” Lynn said.

Notice how I dropped the tags once I established that the conversation takes place only between two characters. Remember, the dialogue tags exist only to let the reader know who’s talking. Once you’ve established the order of things, you’re free to drop a few tags and only add them as needed for clarity.

Notice how I only use the simple tag of said for each of these lines of dialogue. You may have seen other verbs used as dialogue tags such as replied, laughed, exclaimed, shouted, yelled, etc.

Don’t do this ever!

While the old creative writing industry standard used to accept tags like the ones above, things have changed over the last few years. As a writer, your goal should always be to immerse the reader into your writing. The reader should forget they’re reading a story and, instead, feel as if they’re part of it. Using the simple he said/she said dialogue tags, allows the reader to move through dialogue more easily.

Try reading the following:

            “Hey!” Angela shouted. “Bill!”             “Oh, what’s up, Angela?” Bill questioned.             “I thought that was you,” Angela replied, seductively. “Love the new haircut.”             “Gee, thanks,” Bill laughed.             “It looks great!” Angela exclaimed.

Did you find that more challenging to read than the earlier samples? I bet you did. Any reader might easily become overwhelmed with all the meaningless verbs that steal the focus from the dialogue between the characters. Do your readers a favor and stick with say / said/says .

• Quotes inside of quotes. Occasionally, you might have a character speak about something another person said within your dialogue. Don’t worry, this is less complicated than it sounds. If your character needs to quote another character, you can differentiate this using the single quote marks ‘ ’.

“I asked mom if I could go out tonight, but she said, ‘you have to do chores first.’”

• Actions that occur before or after dialogue go in a separate sentence. Remember that what your character says and what your narrator says are two completely different things. Even if your character’s actions happen on the same line of dialogue, you should put this in its own sentence.

            Beasley shouted. “Don’t do that!”             “Oh, no!” Beasley covered her mouth.

It some cases, you might slide by with the action attached to the dialogue sentence as long as it’s on the shorter side.

            “I’m so tired,” Beasley said, rubbing her eyes.

• Punctuation stays inside the quotation marks. When it comes to dialogue, punctuation remains inside the quotation marks at all times. If someone asks a question or shouts, the ? and the ! both live inside the quotes.

“How dare you?” he said. “Oh my God!” she said.

Punctuation marks within dialogue carry the same importance as they do in exposition because they let the reader know how a character might have said something. It communicates to the reader when a sentence ends and also gives a clue to the pacing of what’s being said.

            “Oh my God, Jess!” Margie said. “I just bought fresh apples that taste like candy.”             “Really, Margie?” Jess said.

Notice how the highlighted punctuation told you how to read the dialogue.

• Think of the dialogue and the tag as the same sentence. When deciding to choose between a comma, period, or other punctuation, consider where your sentence actually ends. When it comes to placing periods and commas in a line of dialogue, remember that your dialogue tag is part of the dialogue too.

If the character asks a question in dialogue, the first letter (besides a name, obviously) remains lowercase because the line of dialogue is not complete until after the tag, therefore, the period goes after the tag.

“I think I see the pumpkin patch!” she said.

Notice how, even with the exclamation mark, I use a lowercase s for the dialogue tag. This is because you must consider the dialogue tag and the dialogue itself as a single sentence.

Sometimes a dialogue tag better serves the dialogue in the middle of the speech. In this case, you may use commas to indicate short breaks, and the final punctuation marker will complete the sentence.

“Hey, Jenny,” Kerry said, “you like pumpkins soup, right?”

• If you’re narrator interrupts the dialogue, use lowercase on the first letter of that section. Sometimes it’s necessary for the narrator to give a bit more description about how the character is speaking the dialogue. For example, if the character is stammering, coughing during a sentence, or something similar, the reader will want to know this information.

“Listen carefully,” she lowered her voice to a whisper, “we won’t make it out.”

Remember that your line of dialogue and the tag or narrative descriptor are part of the same sentence, therefore, I begin the narrative fragment with a lowercase s .

9. If the character’s dialogue lasts more than a paragraph without a break, use an additional opening quotation to begin the next paragraph, but don’t use a closing one until they’re done speaking. This is something that shouldn’t happen often, but when it does, at least you’ll be prepared. If your character is a long-winded kind of talker, he might ramble for an entire paragraph without the narrator intervening.

Check out the image to get an idea of what this should look like.

Hopefully these tips will help improve your dialogue and creative writing as a whole. If you want to learn more about dialogue or other aspects of creative writing or grammar, check out our other articles or YouTube channel.

Beasley is native to North Carolina but claims no town as her own. She has her BFA in creative writing and a certificate of publication from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington where she also minored in Spanish. Beasley’s favorite thing to write is fantasy fiction. Beasley has had the opportunity to dabble in many fields in her 26 years: traveling the world, modeling for top fashion houses, and earning a writing degree. Putting her found passions together, she created this site for people to find fashion ideas and writing tips, as well as her professional work ranging from her modeling career to published pieces.

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How to Write Dialogue in a Narrative Paragraph

Hayley Milliman

What is Dialogue?

How to write dialogue, how to punctuate your dialogue, periods and commas, question marks and exclamation points, final thoughts.

Dialogue is the written conversational exchange between two or more characters.

Conventional English grammar rules tell us that you should always start a new paragraph when someone speaks in your writing.

“Let’s get the heck out of here right now,” Mary said, turning away from the mayhem.

John looked around the pub. “Maybe you’re right,” he said and followed her towards the door.

Sometimes, though, in the middle of a narrative paragraph, your main character needs to speak.

Mary ducked away from flying fists. The fight at the pub was getting out of control. One man was grabbing bar stools and throwing them at others, and while she watched, another one who you could tell worked out regularly grabbed men by their shirt collars and tossed them out of the way. Almost hit by one flying person, she turned to John and said, “Let’s get the heck out of here right now.”

In my research, I couldn’t find any hard and fast rules that govern how to use dialogue in the middle of a narrative paragraph. It all depends on what style manual your publisher or editorial staff follow.

For example, in the Chicago Manual of Style , putting dialogue in the middle of paragraphs depends on the context. As in the above example, if the dialogue is a natural continuation of the sentences that come before, it can be included in your paragraph. The major caveat is if someone new speaks after that, you start a new paragraph and indent it.

On the other hand, if the dialogue you’re writing departs from the sentences that come before it, you should start a new paragraph and indent the dialogue.

The fight at the pub was getting out of control. One man was grabbing bar stools and throwing them at others, and another one who you could tell worked out regularly grabbed men by their shirt collars and tossed them out of the way.

Punctuation for dialogue stays consistent whether it’s included in your paragraph or set apart as a separate paragraph. We have a great article on how to punctuate your dialogue here: Where Does Punctuation Go in Dialogue?

It’s often a stylistic choice whether to include your dialogue as part of the paragraph. If you want your dialogue to be part of the scene described in preceding sentences, you can include it.

But if you want your dialogue to stand out from the action, start it in the next paragraph.

Dialogue is a fantastic way to bring your readers into the midst of the action. They can picture the main character talking to someone in their mind’s eye, and it gives them a glimpse into how your character interacts with others.

That said, dialogue is hard to punctuate, especially since there are different rules for different punctuation marks—because nothing in English grammar is ever easy, right?

We’re going to try to make this as easy as possible. So we’ll start with the hardest punctuation marks to understand.

For American English, periods and commas always go inside your quotation marks, and commas are used to separate your dialogue tag from the actual dialogue when it comes at the beginning of a sentence or in the middle. Here are a few examples:

Nancy said, “Let’s go to the park today since the weather is so beautiful.”

“Let’s go to the park today since the weather is so beautiful,” she said.

“Let’s go to the park today,” she said, “since the weather is so beautiful.”

British English puts the periods and commas inside the quotation marks if they’re actually part of the quoted words or sentence. Consider the following example:

• She sang “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”, the theme song from The Wizard of Oz.

In the above example, the comma after “Rainbow” is not part of the quoted material and thus belongs outside the quotation marks.

But for most cases when you’re punctuating dialogue, the commas and periods belong inside the quotation marks.

Where these punctuation marks go depends on the meaning of your sentence. If your main character is asking someone a question or exclaiming about something, the punctuation marks belongs inside the quotation marks.

Nancy asked, “Does anyone want to go to the park today?”

Marija said, “That’s fantastic news!”

“Please say you’re still my friend!” Anna said.

“Can we just leave now?” asked Henry.

But if the question mark or exclamation point is for the sentence as a whole instead of just the words inside the quotation marks, they belong outside of the quotes.

Does your physical therapist always say to his patients, “You just need to try harder”?

Do you agree with the saying, “All’s fair in love and war”?

Single Quotation Marks

Only use single quotation marks for quotes within quotes, such as when a character is repeating something someone else has said. Single quotes are never used for any other purpose.

Avery said, “I saw a sign that read ‘Welcome to America’s Greatest City in the Midwest’ when I entered town this morning.”

“I heard Mona say to her mom, ‘You know nothing whatsoever about me,’ ” said Jennifer.

Some experts put a space after the single quote and before the main quotation mark like in the above example to make it easier for the reader to understand.

Here’s a trickier example of single quotation marks, question marks, and ending punctuation, just to mix things up a little.

• Mark said, “I heard her ask her lawyer, ‘Am I free to go?’ after the verdict was read this morning.”

Perfectly clear, right? Let us know some of your trickiest dialogue punctuation situations in the comments below.

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Hayley is the Head of Education and Community at ProWritingAid. Prior to joining this team, Hayley spent several years as an elementary school teacher and curriculum developer in Memphis, TN. When Hayley isn't hunched over her keyboard, you can find her figure skating at the ice rink or hiking with her dog.

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How to write dialogue in an essay mla format

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How do I punctuate quoted dialogue from a novel?

How you punctuate quoted dialogue from a novel will depend on what you are quoting and how you are quoting it. See the three most common considerations below.

Quoting Dialogue and Text

If you are incorporating a quotation featuring both exposition and a character’s speech into your text, use double quotation marks around the quotation and single quotation marks around the character’s speech that is within the quotation:

Early in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s  The Great Gatsby ,   Miss Baker, upon meeting Nick Carraway, makes the first reference in the novel to the title character: “‘You live in West Egg,’ she remarked contemptuously. ‘I know somebody there’” (11).

Quoting Only Dialogue

If you quote only the speech, use double quotation marks around it:

Early in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s  The Great Gatsby , Miss Baker tells Nick Carraway that he must be familiar with someone she knows from West Egg: “You must know Gatsby” (11).

Using Block Quotes

When quoting dialogue from a novel, set the quotation off from your text as a block if each character’s speech starts on a new line in the source. Indent the extract half an inch from the left margin, as you would any block quotation. If a character’s speech runs onto a new line, as it does below, indent each line of dialogue an additional half an inch. Use double quotation marks around the spoken words : 

Early in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s  The Great Gatsby , Miss Baker tells the narrator, Nick Carraway, that she knows someone from his town: “You live in West Egg,” she remarked contemptuously. “I know somebody there.” “I don’t know a single–” “You must know Gatsby.” “Gatsby?” demanded Daisy. “What Gatsby?” (11) Work Cited Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. Scribner, 1953.

• Do You Indent Dialogue?

by Dax MacGregor

When writing dialogue, you start a new paragraph every time a different character speaks. In a manuscript, every paragraph is indented. So yes, dialogue is indented.

Dialogue has many other formatting rules. Be sure to check our article How to Format Dialogue (with Examples) for all the details. For complete information about formatting manuscripts, you’ll want to visit our Proper Manuscript Format page.

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What Is an Indentation?

Glossary of Grammatical and Rhetorical Terms

• An Introduction to Punctuation
• Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
• M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
• B.A., English, State University of New York

In a composition , an indentation is a blank space between a margin and the beginning of a line of text .

     The beginning of this paragraph is indented. Standard paragraph indentation is about five spaces or one-quarter to one-half of an inch, depending on which style guide you follow. In online writing , if your software doesn't allow indentation, insert a line space to indicate a new paragraph.

The opposite of first-line indentation is a format called hanging indentation . In a hanging indent, all the lines of a paragraph or entry are indented except the first line. Examples of this kind of indentation are found in résumés, outlines , bibliographies , glossaries , and indexes.

Indentation and Paragraphing

• "The whole idea of a paragraph  is to make things easier for the reader. You indent at the beginning of a paragraph to signal, 'Hey, Reader! I'm shifting gears now.' All of the ideas in this paragraph are about the same main thing. ... The indent—a nice big indent of at least half an inch—also makes things easier on the reader's eyes." (Gloria Levine,  The Princeton Review Roadmap to the Virginia SOL . Random House, 2005)
• "The most common use of indentation is at the beginning of a paragraph , where the first line is usually indented five spaces. ... Another use of indentation is in outlining , in which each subordinate entry is indented under its major entry. ... A long quotation [that is, a block quotation ] may be indented in a manuscript instead of being enclosed in quotation marks . The indentation varies, depending on what documentation style you are following. If you are not following a specific style manual , you may block indent one-half inch or ten spaces from both the right and left margins for reports and other documents." (Gerald J. Alred, Charles T. Brusaw, and Walter E. Oliu, The Business Writer's Handbook , 7th ed. Macmillan, 2003)
• "Paragraph structure is part and parcel of the structure of the discourse as a whole; a given [unit of discourse] becomes a paragraph not by virtue of its structure but because the writer elects to indent, his indentation functioning, as does all punctuation , as a gloss upon the overall literary process under way at that point. Paragraphs are not composed; they are discovered. To compose is to create, to indent is to interpret." (Paul Rodgers, Jr., "A Discourse-Centered Rhetoric of the Paragraph." CCC , February 1966)

Formatting for Dialogue

•  "Formatting for dialogue involves several steps: * Use quotation marks before and after the actual spoken words. * Put end punctuation (such as a period ) inside the end quotation mark. * Indent when a new speaker begins." (John Mauk and John Metz,  The Composition of Everyday Life: A Guide to Writing , 5th ed. Cengage, 2016)
•      "Haven't you ever had people coming over and no time to shop? You have to make do with what's in the fridge, Clarice. May I call you Clarice?" "Yes. I think I'll just call you—" "Dr. Lecter—that seems most appropriate to your age and station," he said. (Thomas Harris,  The Silence of the Lambs . St. Martin's, 1988)

The Origin of Paragraph Indentation

• "Paragraph indention, by the way, arises from that habit of early printers, following the practice of scribes, which consists in leaving a blank space for the insertion of a large initial by the illuminator." (Eric Partridge, You Have a Point There: A Guide to Punctuation and Its Allies . Routledge, 1978)
• "By the seventeenth century the indent was the standard paragraph break in Western prose. The rise of printing encouraged the use of space to organize texts. A gap in a printed page feels more deliberate than a gap in a manuscript because it is made by a slug of lead rather than a flux in handwriting." (Ellen Lupton and J. Abbot Miller, Design, Writing, Research . Princeton Architectural Press, 1996)
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Writing A Narrative Essay

• Library Resources
• Books & EBooks
• What is an Narrative Essay?
• Choosing a Topic
• MLA Formatting

Using Dialogue

• Using Descriptive Writing
• OER Resources
• Copyright, Plagiarism, and Fair Use

Examples of Dialogue Tags

Examples of Dialogue Tags:

interrupted

Ebooks in Galileo

Additional Links & Resources

• Dialogue Cheat Sheet

Dialogue is an exchange of conversation between two or more people or characters in a story. As a literary style, dialogue helps to advance the plot, reveal a character's thoughts or emotions, or shows the character's reaction within the story. Dialogue gives life to the story and supports the story's atmosphere.

There are two types of dialogue that can be used in an narrative essay.

Direct dialogue  is written between inverted commas or quotes. These are the actual spoken words of a character 

Indirect dialogue  is basically telling someone about what another person said

Formatting Dialogue

Dialogue is an important part of a narrative essay, However formatting dialogue can be troublesome at times.

When formatting dialogue use these rules and examples to help with your formatting:

Place double quotation marks at the beginning an end of spoken words.  The quotations go on the  outside  of both the words and end-of-dialogue punctuation.

• Example:  "What is going on here?" John asked.

Each speaker gets a new paragraph that is indented.

      “hi,” said John as he stretched out his hand.

           "Good Morning, how are you?" said Brad shaking John’s hand.

                      "Good. Thanks for asking," John said.

Each speaker’s actions are in the same paragraph as their dialogue.

 A  dialogue tag  is anything that indicates which character spoke and describes how they spoke.

If the tag comes before the dialogue,  use a comma straight after the tag. If the dialogue is the beginning of a sentence, capitalize the first letter. End the dialogue with the appropriate punctuation (period, exclamation point, or question mark), but keep it INSIDE the quotation marks.

• Examples Before: 

James said, “I’ll never go shopping with you again!”

John said, “It's a great day to be at the beach.”

She opened the door and yelled, “Go away! Leave me alone!”

If the dialogue tag comes after the dialogue , Punctuation still goes INSIDE quotation marks. Unless the dialogue tag begins with a proper noun, it is  not  capitalized. End the dialogue tag with appropriate punctuation. Use comma after the quote unless it ends with a question mark or exclamation mark.

• Examples After: 

“Are you sure this is real life?” Lindsay asked.

“It’s so gloomy out,” he said.

“Are we done?” asked Brad . 

“This is not your concern!” Emma said.

If dialogue tag is in the middle of dialogue.  A comma should be used before the dialogue tag inside the closing quotation mark; Unless the dialogue tag begins with a proper noun, it is  not  capitalized. A comma is used after the dialogue tag, outside of quotation marks, to reintroduce the dialogue. End the dialogue with the appropriate punctuation followed by the closing quotation marks. 

When it is two sentences, the first sentence will end with a punctuation mark and the second begins with a capital letter.

• Examples middle: 

“Let’s run away,” she whispered, “we wont get another chance.”

“I thought you cared.” Sandy said, hoping for an explanation. “How could you walk away?”

“I can’t believe he’s gone,” Jerry whispered. “I’ll miss him.”

Questions in dialogue.  

if there is a dialogue tag, the question mark will act as a comma and you will then lowercase the first word in the dialogue tag 

• Example: What are you doing?" he asked.

if there is simply an action after the question, the question mark acts as a period and you will then capitalize the first word in the next sentence.

“Sarah, why didn't you text me back?” Jane asked.

“James, why didn’t you show up?” Carol stomped her feet in anger before slamming the door behind her.

If the question or exclamation ends the dialogue, do not use commas to separate the dialogue from dialogue tags.

• Example:  “Sarah, why didn't you text me back?” Jane asked.

If the sentence containing the dialogue is a question, then the        question mark goes outside of the quotation marks.

Did the teacher say, “The Homework is due Tomorrow”?

If you have to quote something within the dialogue.  When a character quotes someone else, use double-quotes around what your character says, then single-quotes around the speech they’re quoting.

• Example: 

"When doling out dessert, my grandmother always said, 'You may have a cookie for each hand.'"

Dashes & Ellipses:

Dashes ( — ) are used to indicate abruptly interrupted dialogue or when one character's dialogue is interrupted by another character.

Use an em dash  inside  the quotation marks to cut off the character mid-dialogue, usually with either (A) another character speaking or (B) an external action.

• Including the em dash at the end of the line of dialogue signifies that your character wasn't finished speaking.
• If the speaking character's action interrupts their own dialogue . 
• Use em dashes  outside  the quotation marks to set off a bit of action without a speech verb. 

Examples: 

• Heather ran towards Sarah with excitement. “You won’t believe what I found out—”
• "Is everything—" she started to ask, but a sharp look cut her off.
• "Look over there—" She snapped her mouth shut so she didn't give the secret away.
• "Look over there"—she pointed towards the shadow—"by the stairway."

Use ellipses (...) when a character has lost their train of thought or can't figure out what to say

• Example:  “You haven’t…” he trailed off in disbelief.

Action Beats

Action beats show what a character is doing before, during, or after their dialogue.

“This isn't right.” She squinted down at her burger. “Does this look like it is well done to you?”

She smiled. “I loved the center piece you chose.”

If you separate two complete sentences, you will simply place the action beat as its own sentence between two sets of quotes.

“I never said he could go to the concert.” Linda sighed and sat in her chair. “He lied to you again.”

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How to Properly to Cite Dialogue in MLA

Last Updated: February 13, 2024 References

This article was reviewed by Gerald Posner and by wikiHow staff writer, Jennifer Mueller, JD . Gerald Posner is an Author & Journalist based in Miami, Florida. With over 35 years of experience, he specializes in investigative journalism, nonfiction books, and editorials. He holds a law degree from UC College of the Law, San Francisco, and a BA in Political Science from the University of California-Berkeley. He’s the author of thirteen books, including several New York Times bestsellers, the winner of the Florida Book Award for General Nonfiction, and has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History. He was also shortlisted for the Best Business Book of 2020 by the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing. There are 8 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been viewed 67,365 times.

When you're writing a paper about a work of literature, such as a play or story, you might need to quote from the dialogue. If you're using the citation style of the Modern Language Association (MLA), your Works Cited entry will be the same as it would be for any book, play, or other source. However, the format and in-text citation of dialogue can be a little tricky, especially when you're quoting several lines of dialogue directly.

In-Text Citation

Use this method if your quote is short (3 lines or fewer) and only includes speech from one character. [1] X Research source

• For example, you might write: Nick, the narrator of the story, clearly has class insecurity: "'You make me feel uncivilized, Daisy,' I confessed on my second glass of corky but rather impressive claret. 'Can't you talk about crops or something?'" (Fitzgerald 15)

• For example, you might write: Tom brings his racism full center when he exclaims that "civilization's going to pieces." (Fitzgerald 15)
• For example, you might write: Tom describes a book he's been reading and asserts "The idea is if we don't look out the white race will be — will be utterly submerged. It's all scientific stuff; it's been proved" (Fitzgerald 16).

Block Quotes

Use this method for quotes that are longer than 3 lines or include speech from more than one character.

• For example, you might write: "You don't have to read far into Fitzgerald's book to encounter outright racism:" and then follow with a block quote about Tom discussing his white supremacist thoughts.

• With dialogue from a novel or short story, retain the paragraph format that appears in the original source and use double quotation marks around the spoken dialogue.
• If you're quoting dialogue from a play, the margins are different. The entire quote is set off 1 in (2.5 cm) from the text of your paper. Each subsequent line beyond a character's first is indented an additional 0.25 in (0.64 cm) (about 3 spaces). [7] X Research source

• Don't use quotation marks anywhere in the dialogue when block-quoting dialogue from a play.
• For example, you might quote the dialogue before Romeo and Juliet's first kiss: ROMEO. Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too? JULIET. Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer. ROMEO. O then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. JULIET. Saints do not move, though grant for prayers' sake. ROMEO. Then move not while my prayer's effect I take. (Shakespeare 1.5.112-117)

• For example, the last lines of your block quote might look like this: And I hope she'll be a fool — that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool." (Fitzgerald 19-20)

Works Cited

Use this method to organize information about the source in your Works Cited entry.

• Example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott.
• If there are 2 authors, list them in the order they appear on the title page of the book. Place a comma after the first author's first name, then type the word "and," followed by the second author's first and last name. (Example: Smith, John and Sally Ride)
• If there are 3 or more authors, list only the first author's name, add a comma after their first name, then type the abbreviation "et al." (Example: Smith, John, et al.)

• Book example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby .
• Short story example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz."

• Short story example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz." The Short Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald , edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli,
• For literary journals or other periodicals , include the volume and issue numbers as well.

• Book example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby . Scribner, 2004.
• Short story example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz." The Short Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald , edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli, Scribner, 1995.

• Book example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby . Scribner, 2004. gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200041h.html.
• Short story example: Fitzgerald, F. Scott. "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz." The Short Stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald , edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli, Scribner, 1995. public-library.uk/ebooks/28/56.pdf.

Template to Cite Dialogue in MLA

Expert Q&A

• If you're quoting Shakespeare , use the act, verse, and line numbers, rather than the page numbers of the specific edition you're using. With other plays, use the page number, as you would with any book. [15] X Research source Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

• This article describes how to cite dialogue using MLA 8th edition (2016). If your instructor or supervisor has you using a different edition, the format might be different. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

• ↑ https://www.monmouth.edu/resources-for-writers/documents/mla-citing-drama.pdf/
• ↑ https://style.mla.org/citing-dialogue-from-a-novel/
• ↑ https://libguides.msjc.edu/c.php?g=498977&p=3416596
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_style_guide/mla_works_cited_page_books.html
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_style_guide/mla_works_cited_page_basic_format.html
• ↑ https://style.mla.org/works-cited-a-quick-guide/
• ↑ https://dcc.libguides.com/c.php?g=904157&p=6508010
• ↑ http://msweinfurter.weebly.com/uploads/5/4/3/7/5437316/mla_in_text_citation_of_poetry_and_drama_godot_and_auden.pdf

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• Writing Tips

A Guide to Indenting Paragraphs

4-minute read

• 9th July 2022

Indentation refers to the gap between the left-hand margin and the beginning of text on the page or screen. Like font choice and line spacing , indentation might seem like a trivial formatting decision, but using indentation effectively makes your writing more professional-looking and easier to read.

In this guide, we’ll summarize the rules for indentation given by three of the most common style guides. Then we’ll explain the simplest way to apply paragraph indentation in Microsoft Word. First though, what are the different types of indentation?

Indentation Options

Microsoft Word offers three choices of indentation style:

●  Standard: Each line of text is indented by a specified amount. This type of indentation is useful for block quotes and other sections of text that you want to set apart.

●  First line: Indentation is applied to the first line of each paragraph. This provides a visual clue to readers that you’re shifting focus or introducing a new idea.

●  Hanging: An indent is applied to the second and subsequent lines of each paragraph. Hanging indentation is most often used in works cited lists and bibliographies, as it enables readers to easily scan the list of authors.

Indentation in APA Style

In APA , you should indent the first line of each paragraph by 0.5” (1.27 cm). This rule also applies to the abstract, except for the first line, which should be left aligned.

Standard indentation of 0.5” is applied to block quotations, and if the quote runs to more than one paragraph, you must indent the first line of the second and subsequent paragraphs by a further 0.5”.

The entries in an APA reference list should have a hanging indent of 0.5”.

Indentation in MLA Style

The guidelines for MLA are very similar to those of APA with a slight difference in the formatting of block quotes. In MLA, the first line of the second and subsequent paragraphs of block quotes should be indented by only 0.25”. Moreover, if the beginning of the first paragraph of the block quote begins a paragraph in the source text, it too should be indented by 0.25”.

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Indentation in Associated Press Style

The Associated Press Stylebook says that you should not use indentation to indicate the start of a new paragraph. Instead, you should hit the Enter key twice at the end of a paragraph (like we do in our blog posts). Block quotes should have standard indentation of 0.5”.

How to Apply Indentation in MS Word

One quick way to indent text is to hit the Tab key when the cursor is at the beginning of a line. This will indent the line by 0.5”. Pressing Tab again will increase the indent by a further 0.5” and so on. However, if you want to apply a consistent indentation style throughout a section or an entire document, it’s more efficient to use the options in the Paragraph section of the Home tab.

To automatically apply indentation to the first line of every paragraph, select Paragraph Options on the Home tab, then choose First line from the list of special indentations. Finally, enter the size of indentation you require in centimeters (e.g., 1.27).

Hanging indentations work in much the same way. You simply choose Hanging instead of First line .

For block quotes, you can use the Increase Indent button, which appears on the Home and Layout tabs. Each time you press it, the indent increases by 0.5”. You can then reduce or remove the indent with the Decrease Indent button.

Alternatively, you could create a custom style for block quotes using the Styles feature. To do this, follow these steps:

• Select the relevant text and apply indentation either with the Increase Indent button or by entering the required size in Paragraph Options .
• With the text still selected, click on the Styles Pane and select New Style.
• A Create New Style from Formatting box should appear. Enter a name for your newly created style (e.g., Block quote ).

You will then be able to choose the same style and easily apply it to all of the block quotes in your document.

Flawless Formatting

We hope you now feel confident about when and how to apply indentation in your writing. When you upload a document to us for proofreading , you can add full formatting as an extra option. Or, if your writing has already been checked for errors, we offer a formatting-only service— contact us today for a quote.

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Writing-Related Software Tutorials

How to Indent Paragraphs in Microsoft Word

By Erin Wright

This tutorial shows how to indent paragraphs in Microsoft Word. Specifically, we will look at how to indent paragraphs with the Tab key, the ruler , and the Paragraph dialog box.

Table of Contents:

How to Use the Tab Key to Indent Paragraphs

How to use the ruler to indent paragraphs, how to use the paragraph dialog box to indent paragraphs.

Watch all the steps shown here in real time!

Explore more than 250 writing-related software tutorials on my YouTube channel .

The images below are from Word for Microsoft 365. These steps also apply to Word 2021, Word 2019, Word 2016, and Word 2013.

Are you on a Mac? Please see “ How to Indent Paragraphs in Word for Mac .”

The quickest way to indent individual paragraphs is to use the Tab key on your keyboard.

• Insert your cursor at the start of the paragraph.
• Press the Tab key on your keyboard.

By default, the Tab key will indent paragraphs one half inch (.5”).

Pro Tip: How to Change the Default Tab Indent Length

• Select the Home tab.
• Select the dialog box launcher in the Paragraph group.

• Select the Tabs button in the Paragraph dialog box.

• Enter a new length into the Default tab stop text box.
• Select the OK button.

See “ How to Create, Change, and Delete Tabs in Microsoft Word ” for more information about using tab stops.

The ruler can be used to indent single paragraphs, multiple paragraphs, or the entire document.

Use the Ruler to Indent Single or Multiple Paragraphs

Skip to step 3 if your ruler is already visible.

• Select the View tab.
• Select Ruler in the Show group.

• Select the paragraph or paragraphs.
• Slide the First Line Indent marker (top ruler marker) to the right to the desired indent length.

Your paragraphs should be indented as you move the ruler marker.

Use the Ruler to Indent the Entire Document

• Select Ruler in the Show group (see figure 5).
• Insert your cursor into a paragraph.
• Select the Home tab (see figure 2).
• Select the Select button.
• Select Select All Text With Similar Formatting from the drop-down menu.

This option selects all the paragraphs in the document without selecting other items that are not normally indented, such as headings.

• Slide the First Line Indent marker (top ruler marker) to the right to the desired indent length (see figure 6).

The Paragraph dialog box lets you indent all the paragraphs in your document while also making additional adjustments to alignment and line spacing .

• Select the Select button .
• Select Select All Text with Similar Formatting from the drop-down menu (see figure 7).

All your paragraphs should now be selected.

• Select the dialog box launcher in the Paragraph group (see figure 2).
• Select First line in the Special menu in the Paragraph dialog box.
• Use the increment arrows to adjust the length of the indent in the By text box.
• Make any additional adjustments to alignment or line spacing.

The Paragraph dialog box should close, and your paragraphs should be indented.

Related Resources

How to Change the Unit of Measurement for the Ruler, Margins, and Indents in Microsoft Word

How to Adjust Paragraph Spacing in Microsoft Word

How to Create Hanging Indents in Microsoft Word (Step-by-Step)

Updated September 23, 2023

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Do You Indent Every Paragraph in an Essay?: How to Indent in Microsoft Word

Indenting paragraphs may appear to be a minor formatting choice, much like the font and line spacing choices. However, properly employing indentation gives your paper a more polished appearance and facilitates its readability. It illustrates a flow of thoughts and coherence in your essay.

Nevertheless, many learners and professional writers forgo or do not fully grasp the idea behind the indentation of paragraphs. This article tackles this concept by answering some of the most pertinent questions about this issue. For example, do you indent every paragraph in an essay? When do you indent a paragraph?

Read on to answer these and more fundamental questions, and get a clearer understanding of indentation in writing.

Do You Indent Every Paragraph in an Essay?

When writing an essay, you should indent the first line of every paragraph. Indentation also applies to dissertations, research papers, theses, and term papers. Note that all formatting styles, including APA, MLA, Harvard, and Chicago, demand indentation when writing paragraphs. Every new paragraph you write should have its initial line indented by ½ inch from the left margin.

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Make sure to indent the paragraphs of an essay and exclude the abstract when composing a paper that requires an abstract. Never indent an abstract. When writing it, position the whole paragraph to the left to avoid an indent. Remember, the unique layout of the abstract makes it stand out from the remainder of the work.

Also see: When do you start writing a new paragraph

Nevertheless, indenting every paragraph in your essay is also subject to your institution’s policies and instructor’s guidelines. Some do not require students to indent paragraphs, especially when the essays should be typed. They prefer students to leave empty lines between paragraphs. Line spacing is also effective in making paragraphs coherent and easily distinguishable.

Do You Indent Paragraphs in APA 7th Edition?

Ensure to indent the lines of each paragraph in your essay or paper when writing it in APA 7th Edition style. You only exclude the abstract, which should not be indented.

In this writing style, the introduction and conclusion paragraphs’ initial lines need to be indented. Therefore, ensure to hit the one-tab space key to indent the line by 1/2 inch when starting a new paragraph. In a word document, you can allow automatic indentation to eliminate blanks between paragraphs and position each paragraph to the left.

Additionally, when using a block quote from a text in a direct quotation, you must indent it. This is true if the quotation spans more than three lines. Indent the full quote 1/2 inch from the left margin, and remember to exclude the quotation marks.

However, make sure to arrange your citations with a hanging indent and left-align them in the referencing list. Furthermore, note that the citation and the commentary should both be in a hanging indent when producing an annotated bibliography.

Do You Indent Every Paragraph in MLA?

In your MLA-formatted essay, you must indent each paragraph. Please ensure to read the MLA formatting special writing requirements. You will notice that the formatting style necessitates every essay writer to include a half-inch indent at the first line of every paragraph.

In MLA, you should indent block quotes too. Any quoted text, four lines or more, is considered a block quote. These lengthy quotations are formatted uniquely. The entire block has an indentation that is 1 inch long rather than the typical ½-inch. Remember, the block’s left margin should be constant; avoid indenting the first line further.

When Do You Indent a Paragraph?

Several instances would demand you as a writer to indent paragraphs when writing your essay. Please keep scrolling to learn and understand these instances.

When Shifting from a Concept or a Subtopic to Another

It’s time to create a new paragraph through indentation when the content, facts, details, or thoughts change to address a different aspect of the subject. Therefore, you can indent a paragraph when you want to explore a new concept, slightly independent from the previous paragraph.

The much-despised formatting method of indentation gives readers a sense of order. Readers are informed by indentations when they are about to explore a new subject or begin a new portion of a text. Indenting supports the logical material presentation.

When Shifting from One Setting to another

Using indentation in paragraphs to illustrate a change of setting is most common in narrative essays. When there is a change in time, place, emotion, occasion, date, direction, or dimension, you, as the writer, should indent to let your readers know. Doing so enhances the flow of information and events for your instructor and readers.

When Changing Speakers During a Dialogue

It is vital to indent paragraphs every time characters in your essay have a dialogue. It helps your readers to identify the shifts in speakers and, therefore, appreciate the flow of the dialogue.

How to Indent in Microsoft Word

There are several ways to indent paragraphs in Microsoft Word. Below are two of the most applicable ones and their explanations.

Using the Tab Key to Indent Individual Paragraphs

When using this technique, you press the Tab key after moving the cursor at the start of the topic sentence. Doing so will leave a 1/2-inch indent in the row. Remember, you can raise the indentation by another ½-inch by pressing the Tab button again, and so on.

Using the Ruler Technique

This technique is the fastest if you wish to indent all the paragraphs in your essay as a group. Below is a guideline on how to maneuver through this method

• Go to the ribbon and select the Home tab.
• Put the cursor at the start of a paragraph.
• Move to the Editing group at the top right corner of the page and click “Select.”
• Press the “Select Text with Similar Formatting” from the drop-down menu.
• Then, click the “View tab” in the ribbon.
• In the Show group, choose Ruler.
• Moving the top ruler marker toward the right will find the required indent length.

So, do you indent every paragraph in an essay? Most students are unsure whether to use indentation, despite it being a vital formatting strategy in writing academic papers. Fortunately, this article has clarified most aspects of indentation by answering some of the most fundamental questions on the concept.

Please ensure you write your next essay correctly by utilizing the above information. Additionally, ensure you have appropriately indented your document while you review for inconsistencies and style.

Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

MLA Formatting Quotations

Welcome to the Purdue OWL

This page is brought to you by the OWL at Purdue University. When printing this page, you must include the entire legal notice.

Copyright ©1995-2018 by The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, reproduced, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our terms and conditions of fair use.

When you directly quote the works of others in your paper, you will format quotations differently depending on their length. Below are some basic guidelines for incorporating quotations into your paper. Please note that all pages in MLA should be double-spaced .

Short quotations

To indicate short quotations (four typed lines or fewer of prose or three lines of verse) in your text, enclose the quotation within double quotation marks. Provide the author and specific page number (in the case of verse, provide line numbers) in the in-text citation, and include a complete reference on the Works Cited page. Punctuation marks such as periods, commas, and semicolons should appear after the parenthetical citation.

Question marks and exclamation points should appear within the quotation marks if they are a part of the quoted passage, but after the parenthetical citation if they are a part of your text.

For example, when quoting short passages of prose, use the following examples:

When using short (fewer than three lines of verse) quotations from poetry, mark breaks in verse with a slash, ( / ), at the end of each line of verse (a space should precede and follow the slash). If a stanza break occurs during the quotation, use a double slash ( // ).

Long quotations

For quotations that are more than four lines of prose or three lines of verse, place quotations in a free-standing block of text and omit quotation marks. Start the quotation on a new line, with the entire quote indented 1/2   inch  from the left margin while maintaining double-spacing. Your parenthetical citation should come  after the closing punctuation mark . When quoting verse, maintain original line breaks. (You should maintain double-spacing throughout your essay.)

For example, when citing more than four lines of prose, use the following examples :

Nelly Dean treats Heathcliff poorly and dehumanizes him throughout her narration: They entirely refused to have it in bed with them, or even in their room, and I had no more sense, so, I put it on the landing of the stairs, hoping it would be gone on the morrow. By chance, or else attracted by hearing his voice, it crept to Mr. Earnshaw's door, and there he found it on quitting his chamber. Inquiries were made as to how it got there; I was obliged to confess, and in recompense for my cowardice and inhumanity was sent out of the house. (Bronte 78)

When citing long sections of poetry (four lines of verse or more), keep formatting as close to the original as possible.

In his poem "My Papa's Waltz," Theodore Roethke explores his childhood with his father:

The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy. We Romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother's countenance Could not unfrown itself. (qtd. in Shrodes, Finestone, Shugrue 202)

When citing two or more paragraphs, use block quotation format, even if the passage from the paragraphs is less than four lines. If you cite more than one paragraph, the first line of the second paragraph should be indented an extra 1/4 inch to denote a new paragraph:

In "American Origins of the Writing-across-the-Curriculum Movement," David Russell argues,

Writing has been an issue in American secondary and higher education since papers and examinations came into wide use in the 1870s, eventually driving out formal recitation and oral examination. . . .

From its birth in the late nineteenth century, progressive education has wrestled with the conflict within industrial society between pressure to increase specialization of knowledge and of professional work (upholding disciplinary standards) and pressure to integrate more fully an ever-widening number of citizens into intellectually meaningful activity within mass society (promoting social equity). . . . (3)

Adding or omitting words in quotations

If you add a word or words in a quotation, you should put brackets around the words to indicate that they are not part of the original text:

If you omit a word or words from a quotation, you should indicate the deleted word or words by using ellipses, which are three periods ( . . . ) preceded and followed by a space. For example:

Please note that brackets are not needed around ellipses unless they would add clarity.

When omitting words from poetry quotations, use a standard three-period ellipses; however, when omitting one or more full lines of poetry, space several periods to about the length of a complete line in the poem:

Role Play Dialogue Agents

By Dr. David Traum, Research Professor of Computer Science, Director for Natural Language Research, ICT

Dr. David Traum is Director for Natural Language Research at ICT. In this essay he examines the linguistic interplay between humans and machines, drawing on historical antecedents, such as the Turing Test, tracing a line through intelligent assistants and open-domain conversational partners – to the role play dialogue agents currently in use in his own laboratory.

How should we talk with computers? This question predates any actual artificial intelligence applications, but still didn’t have a definitive answer at the beginning of the ICT or even today, 25 years later. Some follow Alan Turing’s famous “test” , that we could attribute intelligence to machines, only if they were able to talk as much like people as men and women talk like each other. Certainly there would be many benefits of “ getting computers to talk like you and me” , especially in that we wouldn’t have to learn new ways of communication to talk to or understand machines. 

On the other hand, more recently many have pointed out ethical issues with computers pretending to be real people , or talking in a way that would make it difficult for people to know if they were talking to a person or a machine. Those favoring this approach point out the differences between humans and (current and possibly future) machines and posit that this means we should also talk differently with computers than the way we do with each other, because computers are very different from people.

When we talk to each other, much of our communication depends on the activities we are engaged in and the roles we are playing in that activity. This can include the words we use, the frequencies of words, the tone of voice and accompanying non-verbal behaviors used, but also the kinds of meanings and responses expected even for the same words uttered. For example, a question might get very different responses if coming from a teammate in the midst of a collaborative task, or from a stranger at the bus stop, or from a classroom instructor, or in a courtroom from an attorney. While a simple correct answer might suffice in all cases, the situations  differ in terms of acceptability of refusing to answer, giving an incorrect answer, pleading ignorance, or providing a helpful way of finding out the information. But what are the appropriate “roles” for the activities of human-computer dialogue? How are these similar or different from human roles such as the above examples in related activities between humans?

Most computer dialogue systems fall into two broad categories: intelligent assistants or open-domain conversational partners . Assistants are meant to help a person achieve some task. They are constructed to interact with users to first determine the user’s intent with respect to the details of the task (e.g, providing information, providing instructions, booking a ticket, or setting an alarm) and then carry out the task and report back. Thus the focus can be on the task itself, rather than the identities and relationship of the participants, similar to one-time service encounters at a fast food restaurant or customer help desk. 

Open domain systems are more inspired by the Turing test and require the computer to talk intelligently about any possible subject the user wants to bring up (though it’s ok to say they don’t know much about that topic). There have been numerous competitions, such as the Loebner prize and Amazon Alexa challenge that have assessed efforts in this area. Often the goals have switched from trying to be indistinguishable from humans to capturing the interest of conversational participants such that they continue the dialogue for a long amount of time or are rated as highly enjoyable by the participants. Such systems don’t really have a task (other than engaging in conversation), and frequent topics of conversation include aspects of identity, group affiliation, preferences and feelings. It is thus important to establish what the identity of the machine participant actually is – is it pretending to be human? Is it a completely alien, un-human-like machine identity? Does it have some commonalities with human identity, or does it refuse to accept the concept of machine identity? Answers to these questions will impact how people choose to interact with and how they feel about the interaction and the machine.

A third type of system is role-play dialogue agent , much less common in the general dialogue systems community than assistants and open domain chatbots, but central to ICT’s purpose of engaging training and learning environments. These systems play a role in an activity that would typically be done by a person. Having machines that can play these roles allows a user to practice social activities that would normally require multiple people, even if fewer or no other people are available, as conceived in Star Trek’s “Holodeck”. These systems enable different kinds of experiential learning and practice, to sustain and improve skills, by providing role-appropriate circumstances to react to. Role-play dialogue agents are similar to assistant dialogue systems in that they are concerned with one or more tasks, however they can be different in that the system’s role is not always strictly subordinate to the user, as an assistant system would be. Thus understanding the user’s intent is not always enough for the system to carry out a task, sometimes the system must also decide to agree to the user’s request. This may sometimes require a further process of negotiation or argumentation or explanation on the part of the user, just as they would have to do with a person in that activity. Sometimes dialogue agents play the role of opponents who desire not to help the user, but actually to hinder them, and sometimes part of the activity is for the user to determine where the agent’s loyalties lie, and perhaps how to align them. Role-play agents are also similar to open-domain dialogue systems, in that they should respond (in character) to whatever a user says, and their (role-play) identity is often a topic of conversation or structures how they should interact. The difference is the focus on a specific activity and goals of the agent. It is also more clear that it is acceptable for the systems to act “in character” as a human, similar to the way an actor would take on an identity different from their own, for educational or entertainment purposes.

Role play dialogue systems have been central to ICT from the beginning of the institute, with our flagship interdisciplinary “ Mission Rehearsal Exercise Project ,” which involved a human user/training, leading a platoon full of role-players, as well as a potentially angry crowd and others both on and off the user/trainee’s team. 

I was recruited to  ICT in the year 2000, initially by Jeff Rickel from ISI, who realized that the kind of agents he wanted to create for this project needed an ability to reason and talk about tasks and situations beyond just filling in “slots” in a frame, which was the current state of the art. I had previously worked in task-oriented dialogue systems , though looking slightly beyond the assistant role in some of them, considering other kinds of collaboration. It was exciting to come west and work in an environment that considered not just different roles for dialogue agents, but also visual embodiment, immersive display in a virtual reality theater, the role of emotion, pedagogy and cognitive architecture in a unified system that also represented a collaboration with creative professionals from the entertainment industry in support of military doctrine and training. When confronted with problems of what a dialogue agent should do in a particular situation, it was an amazing experience to be able to go beyond introspection and individual research to directly talking with some of the world experts from a variety of points of view – Military Subject Matter Experts, Hollywood writers and other creative professionals, as well as scientists studying linguistics, communication, psychology, pedagogy, and graphics, and sound.. This collaboration helped us focus on new notions of dialogue “success” – not (just) accuracy numbers, but on the impactfulness of the experience.

Our natural language dialogue group has contributed to many ICT projects involving role-play dialogue agents, for a large variety of roles of activities, including teammates , several scenarios within SASO , involving non-team interaction, authoring tools and many scenarios (some written by interns and West Point Cadets) for Tactical Questioning training, virtual patients , interviewers and interviewees , game partners and opponents , wild-west gunslingers and bartenders , counselors , language teachers and practice partners , and many others. It’s been amazing to see many of these projects leave the lab and show up in museums, at Army bases, and elsewhere, where they interact with real users who interact with the characters because they want to, not because someone’s paying them to do it.

So, how should we talk to computers? Ideally, any way we want to, and they will talk to us in ways that are appropriate for the specific circumstances, such as playing a role, where that’s what we want, while keeping ethical issues at a forefront, so roleplay can be easily distinguished from reality where important.

David Traum is the Director for Natural Language Research at the Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT) and Research Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Southern California (USC).  He leads the Natural Language Dialogue Group at ICT. More information about the group can be found here: http://nld.ict.usc.edu/group/   Traum’s research focuses on Dialogue Communication between Human and Artificial Agents.  He has engaged in theoretical, implementational and empirical approaches to the problem, studying human-human natural language and multi-modal dialogue, as well as building a number of dialogue systems to communicate with human users. Traum has authored over 300 refereed technical articles, is a founding editor of the Journal Dialogue and Discourse, has chaired and served on many conference program committees, and is a past President of SIGDIAL, the international special interest group in discourse and dialogue.  Traum earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science at the University of Rochester in 1994.

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‘Stereophonic’ Review: Hitmakers Rendered in Sublime Detail

In David Adjmi’s new play, with songs by Will Butler, a ’70s band’s success breeds tension, and punches up the volume on Broadway.

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By Naveen Kumar

Peering behind the mystique of rock ’n’ roll has undeniable voyeuristic appeal. So there is an immediate thrill to seeing the mahogany-paneled control room and glassed-in sound booth that fill the Golden Theater stage, where “Stereophonic” opened on Friday. But David Adjmi’s astonishing new play, with songs by the former Arcade Fire member Will Butler , delivers more than a dishy glimpse inside the recording studio during rock’s golden age.

A fly-on-the-wall study of how people both need and viciously destroy each other, “Stereophonic” is a fiery family drama, as electrifying as any since “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” Its real-time dissection of making music — a collaboration between flawed, gifted artists wrangled into unison — is ingeniously entertaining and an incisive meta commentary on the nature of art. The play is a staggering achievement, and already feels like a must-see American classic.

It’s 1976 in Sausalito, Calif., and a not-yet-famous band — at least not solely inspired by Fleetwood Mac — is laying down the record that will propel it to stardom and unravel the personal lives of its members (in much the same way that making “Rumours” did for Fleetwood Mac). The setting (a marvel by scenic designer David Zinn) is a pressure-cooker: The coffee machine is broken but there’s a gallon bag of cocaine, and tensions and affections — both creative and personal — are running hot.

Directed with a conductor’s precision by Daniel Aukin, “Stereophonic” is an epic canvas rendered in hyper-intimate detail: whispered confidences and technical adjustments, slouches and stares, lots of lying around and rolling joints. Stillness and silence are as expressive as Adjmi’s meticulously orchestrated dialogue, body language sometimes even more so. It’s possible to read the band’s ascension to fame beyond the confines of the studio, as its previous album creeps up the Billboard charts, in the swiveling hips of its lead singer alone (and in the progression of prints and flares in Enver Chakartash’s divine costumes).

When the poetic and insecure Diana, played with stunning vulnerability by Sarah Pidgeon, sits down at the piano some 45 minutes into the three-hour show, the actor’s radiant voice delivers the first significant composition the audience hears: “Bright,” a folk-tinged rock ballad with sterling, ethereal vocals. Until then, notes trickle out in brief bursts. Often interrupted or doled out in riffs, the expressions of character and discord generated by Butler’s music are abstract — their fragmentation designed to make you want more. (Savor the early sessions when everyone can stand to be in the same room.)

Diana’s toxic romance with Peter (Tom Pecinka) — guitarist, producer, unrelenting narcissist — is a searing and consistent source of emotional combustion. Peter’s willingness to shiv Diana’s soft spots makes the other feuding couple look downright sweet: Reg, the boozing, philosophical bassist (played by Will Brill, with the endearing agility of a Muppet) and the peace-seeking Holly (Juliana Canfield, making an excellent Broadway debut). The level head in the room usually belongs to Simon (a charming Chris Stack), except when an out-of-whack drum kit sends him into a fit.

When the bandmates are in formation behind the recording-booth glass — elevated on a higher plane, their faces enshrined by warm halos (the exquisite lighting is by Jiyoun Chang) — they’re like gods on Mount Olympus glowering down at the tech table. The upstairs-downstairs dynamic between the musicians and their sound engineers, the low-key ambitious Grover (Eli Gelb) and non sequitur-spouting Charlie (Andrew R. Butler), is a font of frequent comedy, including Grover’s crazed, sleep-deprived impression of Peter and Simon, who run him ragged with all-nighters.

But who has more power in a sound studio than the people operating the mics? Grover and Charlie not only hear it all, but control what everyone else (including the audience) hears as well. (Ryan Rumery’s sound design is a technical wonder.) Grover matures the most over the year that the story takes place, from faking it to becoming indispensable, an arc that Gelb traces with unassuming subtlety. Grover’s visibility in the room is another growth indicator; the band goes from treating him like furniture to trusting him implicitly. (Poor Charlie doesn’t rise to the same honor.)

Even now, it’s possible to imagine misty-eyed fans of this production, which premiered Off Broadway in October at Playwrights Horizons (where the New York Times critic Jesse Green called it “relentlessly compelling” ), reflecting on the experience as if it were a once-in-a-lifetime stadium tour. And the Broadway transfer punches up the volume on the climactic moments of synchronicity, when the band nails a stellar take or the layers of a song are combined or fractured to shivering effect.

But the pleasures of “Stereophonic” are more granular and immediate; its close and sustained observation of artists, held captive by their desires to create, yields the most riveting insights. Like, what is the point of it all, anyway? “Life is for enjoyment,” Reg claims. “Life is pain,” Grover counters. If you ask Holly, needing others is the worst part. Still, there can be no harmony without all of the joys and miseries of other people.

Stereophonic Through July 7 at the Golden Theater, Manhattan; stereophonicplay.com . Running time: 3 hours 10 minutes.