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Dear Sir/Madame Punky,
You certainly packed a lot of fat questions into your skinny brief! But seriously, quotation marks and related punctuation is a topic that isn't addressed very often.
Let's begin with what you call "dashes," in Russian тире [ - ]. These are used in literary texts, like short stories, novels, and plays - and, for some reason, in introductory Russian grammar books - to indicate "direct speech." The format is simple: direct speech is preceded by a dash. There is nothing equivalent to an "end quote mark" when dashes are used. However, if the direct statement is followed by a narrative comment on the part of the author, another dash is used between the direct speech and narrative comment. To illustrate:
Дама взглянула на него и тотчас же опустила глаза.
- Он не кусается, - сказала она и покраснела.
- Можно дать ему кость? - и когда она утвердительно
кивнула головой, он спросил приветливо: - Вы давно изволили
приехать в Ялту?
- Дней пять.
- А я уже дотягиваю здесь вторую неделю.
Помолчали немного.
Дама с собачкой, Anton Chekhov
It should be noted that although some contemporary Russian writers have begun using English-like quotation marks to punctuate dialogues, most continue the tradition of using dashes.
One more thing about literary texts:
Various quotation marks, called кавычки in Russian, are oftentimes used in literary texts to mark "internal speech," that is, the thoughts of various characters:
"Однако что же это такое? - подумал господин
Голядкин, - да где же Петрушка?"
"Эта бестия ни за грош готова продать человека,
а тем более барина, - подумал он про себя, - и продал,
неприменно продал, пари готов дежать, что ни за копейку
продал. Ну, что?..."
Двойник, Fyodor Dostoevsky
Now let's move on to non-literary texts: histories, biographies (you know, just plain books!), and newspaper and magazine articles and the like - printed matter, which like literary texts, was once published using printing type.
* * *
If you look up кавычки (quotation marks) in a Russian dictionary, the term is illustrated by both what you term in your missive as "German-type" and "French-type little arrow" quotation marks ["..." или <<...>>]. Publications set in type still use one or the other:
<<Война изранила все тело России, так что народ похож на избитого
до полусмерти человека>>, - говорил Ленин на V Всероссийском
съезда Советов.
"Война изранила все тело России, так что народ похож на избитого
до полусмерти человека", - говорил Ленин на V Всероссийском
съезда Советов.
The use of English-like quotation marks [ "..." ] in Russian is a relatively recent trend, influenced to a great extent, first, by Western-made typewriters, and now, by the popularity and widespread use of word processors and computers. English-like quotation marks are seen most often in Russian journalistic prose, meaning in newspapers and magazines, which are no longer set in type but produced electronically.
The histories of printing and publishing aside, let's move on to the rules for punctuation and quotation marks in Russian.
* * *
Direct Speech (DS) and Narrative Comment (NC)
(Note the shift from capital (C) to lower case (lc) letters,
as well as the syntactic order of various narrative comments.)
The use of quotation marks in Russian follows British-English punctuation, which is to say, periods and commas go outside the closing quotation mark rather than inside it, as in American-English. Otherwise, the rules for quotation marks and associated punctuation can be summed up as follows:
NC introducing DS:
- NC: "DS". Врач сказал: "Ты слишком много пьешь".
- NC: "DS?"Ольга спросила: "Что ты делаешь сегодня вечером?"
- NC: "DS!"Кто-то крикнул: "Осторожно! Двери закрываются!"
NC following DS:
- "DS", - nc. "Ты слишком много пьешь", - сказал врач.
- "DS?" - nc. "Что ты делаешь сегодня вечером?" - спросила Ольга.
- "DS!" - nc. "Осторожно! Двери закрываются!" - крикнул кто-то.
DS between NCs:
- NC: "DS", - nc. Она сказала: "Давай поговорим", - и взяла ее руку.
- NC: "DS?/DS!" - nc.Маша его спросила: "Почему ты никогда не бываешь дома?" - и вдруг заплакала.
- NC: "DS..." - nc.Борис крикнул: "Не стреляйте! Они наши..." - и бросился вперед.
DS interrupted by NCs:
- "DS, - nc, - ds". "Дай карандаш, - она сказала, - и я тебе напишу мой номер".
- "DS, - nc. - DS". "Перестань, моя хорошая, - говорил муж нежно. - Поплакала и будет".
- "DS?/DS! - nc. - DS". "Осторожно! - кто-то крикнул. - Двери закрываются!"
The above "rules" for punctuation associated with quotation marks are constant. And although English-type quotation marks were used for illustration, the same patterns would hold true if either German-type or French-type quotation marks had been used.
Please pass these rules on to a friend. I don't think I could come up with them again.
Virtually yours,
The RLM
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