Re: Expected behaviour of quotation marks

On 4/6/2016 1:58 PM, John Cowan wrote:
> ishida@w3.org scripsit:
>
>> Now, if we mix languages, i think we would end up with:
>>
>> Mais Lucy répond: «Give George my love – once only. Tell him, 'Muddle.' ».
> I can't speak to what publishers actually do, but I think that would be
> absolutely horrible.  Consider mixed AmE-German:
>
>      His exact words were: “Ludwig XIV. sagte, „Der Staat bin ich.“”

Or consider a quote in the Swedish style that appears to begin with the 
double quote that usually ends quotes in English.
>
> At the end, the German close quote and the American English close quote
> are in opposite directions and seem to create an empty string between
> them, nor does adding whitespace help very much.  I think the best
> compromise is to use the quotation marks of the outermost language only:
>
>      His exact words were:  “Ludwig XIV. sagte, ‘Der Staat bin ich.’”
>
> That seems quite readable, given that the sentence is about *what words
> were used*; it's somewhat meaningful even to an anglophone reader who
> doesn't know any German.

That.

But, as Chris suggested, actual practice varies. In the examples here, 
the first has gone fully native in the outer language, the second 
example has gone Anglo-Saxon, and the final one uses foreign quotation 
marks for effect.

            „L'État c'est moi“, lautete sein berühmter Ausspruch: „der 
Staat bin ich“.

    "L'état c'est moi" (Der Staat bin ich) ist ein französischer
    Ausspruch, der Ludwig XIV. zugeschrieben wird.

    Der Leitsatz des Absolutismus, « L’État, c’est moi ! » (deutsch:
    „Der Staat bin ich!“) wird ihm jedoch fälschlicherweise zugeschrieben.

And finally, your example contains other punctuation than just the 
quotation marks. Here is an example that differs from the one you give 
in the transition to the inner quote and, incidentally, does match the 
punctuation rules.

    Ludwig XIV. sagte von sich selbst: „Der Staat bin ich.“

The pressure to conform to the conventions of the outer language is 
normally strong, but sometimes the mistakes are in the source as well.

Using the conventions of the embedding (outer) text has the advantage 
that you and your editors know what should be correct and do not 
inadvertently introduce mistakes. (Aside: I don't think I've ever read 
any book in English that was "decorated" with sprinkles of German where 
there wasn't some mistake somewhere in the latter.)

A./