Multiple people saying the same thing at once: thoughts about double-double quotes?

laccoff_mawning · 2026-05-06T18:11:48+0100

So I wanted to write a line where multiple people say the same thing at once. A quick google search suggests I should use a dialogue tag to convey this information. To give the example in my own work, it would read something like this:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison, before vanishing in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

But I remember reading (in probably a translation on NU or somewhere.) a similar situation, but instead of using a dialogue tag, they used double-double quotes:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!"" The four other heroes vanish in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

And I very much prefer it. I think it makes the story flow just slightly better. In this example it's hardly noticeable, but imagine if I didn't have an action after the quote, which feels pretty common if you want to have a crowd of people exclaim in surprise. Secondly, it tells me multiple people are speaking at once even before I reach the dialogue tag, rather than letting me think it's only one person speaking until I reach the dialogue tag.

Look at the same example without the group action:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison.

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!""

The downside that I see is that it might look odd if you used single quotes for normal dialogue, since a double-single quote might just look like a double quote. I guess you could do a quadruple-single quote, maybe?

'Hey! Does a quadruple-single quote work?'

''''Huh?!''''

So here's my questions:
1. Have you seen a double-double quote used before for this purpose?
2. Do you think it's clear enough using a double quote to represent a crowd speaking at once.
3. What do you think about it in general? Which method do you prefer/use, if you've encountered this before?

Ararara · 2026-05-06T18:14:16+0100

Never seen it, don't think most people would recognize it for what you want it to mean, and I wouldn't use it

TheNonexistentOne · 2026-05-06T18:20:28+0100

laccoff_mawning said:
The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison, before vanishing in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

It's fine, I believe. I also write like this... But in past tense.

Jerynboe · 2026-05-06T18:37:11+0100

This is an entirely new concept to me and seems utterly unneeded given that the context already implies multiple people saying the same thing.

JordanIda · 2026-05-06T18:39:34+0100

If you can't find it in the Oxford Guide to Style or the Little Brown Handbook, it's post-literary newspeak balderdash.

All 50,000 spectators of the colisseum exhorted, as one, "Mercy!"

The1stgod · 2026-05-06T18:43:53+0100

I typically prefer it to not have all things explained in silver platter, but don't be too vague..

So just, "Right" implies all of them speaking, let the readers make something in their mind too..

rileykifer · 2026-05-06T18:45:46+0100

I've never seen it, and if I ever came across something like the second example, I would be very confused as to who was speaking and why there's double quotations, possibly assuming it's just a typo. First example is far more obvious.

LiteraryWho · 2026-05-06T20:06:49+0100

If you really want to get "this is a crowd speaking" front and center in the readers mind, you can put the action of the group ahead of what they're saying. e.g. "The four look at me as one and yelled, 'Right.'"

FRWriter · 2026-05-06T20:17:16+0100

laccoff_mawning said:
The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!"" The four other heroes vanish in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

Never seen that, it looks so stupid.

Just do it like your first example, it's 100% correct and the established norm.

Lysander_Works · 2026-05-06T20:31:46+0100

I too have not seen it before. It's possible you got an AI result making something up, but, if the actual source backs it as correct, we'd all look like crazies.

I think the single quotations are fine, since it's still explained that multiple people shout the same at once anyway.

PancakesWitch · 2026-05-06T20:40:55+0100

This is a such a non issue, you're worrying over nothing, it doesn't matter which way you use it. Nobody will care.

triflight · 2026-05-06T20:52:54+0100

Unlike everyone else it seems, I have seen this before, I think only in translations though. I wonder if it's some remnant of translating from Chinese

Anyways, I think the double quotes look best if the speech is by itself as it is in example 2.

At the end of the day, do whatever you want. It's an extra quote, readers will either figure it out or ignore it, plus if you use it more frequently then readers will start to catch on. It's not grammatically correct but who cares? You're, assumingly, writing for fun so if you like it then use it!

Authors intentionally use bad grammar all the time so I think you can chalk this up to stylistic preference.

Piisfun · 2026-05-06T20:56:42+0100

laccoff_mawning said:
So I wanted to write a line where multiple people say the same thing at once. A quick google search suggests I should use a dialogue tag to convey this information. To give the example in my own work, it would read something like this:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison, before vanishing in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

But I remember reading (in probably a translation on NU or somewhere.) a similar situation, but instead of using a dialogue tag, they used double-double quotes:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!"" The four other heroes vanish in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

And I very much prefer it. I think it makes the story flow just slightly better. In this example it's hardly noticeable, but imagine if I didn't have an action after the quote, which feels pretty common if you want to have a crowd of people exclaim in surprise. Secondly, it tells me multiple people are speaking at once even before I reach the dialogue tag, rather than letting me think it's only one person speaking until I reach the dialogue tag.

Look at the same example without the group action:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison.

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!""

The downside that I see is that it might look odd if you used single quotes for normal dialogue, since a double-single quote might just look like a double quote. I guess you could do a quadruple-single quote, maybe?

'Hey! Does a quadruple-single quote work?'

''''Huh?!''''

So here's my questions:
1. Have you seen a double-double quote used before for this purpose?
2. Do you think it's clear enough using a double quote to represent a crowd speaking at once.
3. What do you think about it in general? Which method do you prefer/use, if you've encountered this before?

Contrary to what some people have said above, this is an actual technique. It's not very common, and in fact it is more common in games where the dialogue boxes may not be able to highlight specific characters.

The major things to note:

Use three sets of quotations, not two.
This only works properly if you used curved quotations with slight spacing between them; it just looks like a typo otherwise.
This is best used on its own line for strong emphasis.

An example: an entire platoon of soldiers responding to orders from a drill sergant.
“““YES, SIR!”””
<immediately follwed by a scene break>

JordanIda · 2026-05-06T21:45:51+0100

Maybe if it's four people speaking, it should be four quotes. """"Right?""""

Hedgeboar · 2026-05-06T23:33:43+0100

laccoff_mawning said:
So I wanted to write a line where multiple people say the same thing at once. A quick google search suggests I should use a dialogue tag to convey this information. To give the example in my own work, it would read something like this:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison, before vanishing in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

But I remember reading (in probably a translation on NU or somewhere.) a similar situation, but instead of using a dialogue tag, they used double-double quotes:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!"" The four other heroes vanish in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

And I very much prefer it. I think it makes the story flow just slightly better. In this example it's hardly noticeable, but imagine if I didn't have an action after the quote, which feels pretty common if you want to have a crowd of people exclaim in surprise. Secondly, it tells me multiple people are speaking at once even before I reach the dialogue tag, rather than letting me think it's only one person speaking until I reach the dialogue tag.

Look at the same example without the group action:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison.

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!""

The downside that I see is that it might look odd if you used single quotes for normal dialogue, since a double-single quote might just look like a double quote. I guess you could do a quadruple-single quote, maybe?

'Hey! Does a quadruple-single quote work?'

''''Huh?!''''

So here's my questions:
1. Have you seen a double-double quote used before for this purpose?
2. Do you think it's clear enough using a double quote to represent a crowd speaking at once.
3. What do you think about it in general? Which method do you prefer/use, if you've encountered this before?

I see this somtimes, and I prefer it. Formal writing only needs to be used in a formal setting (essays, science paper, textbook, etc) Writing fiction is very informal, go for you hearts desire.

PancakesWitch · 2026-05-07T00:32:20+0100

Hedgeboar said:
I see this somtimes, and I prefer it. Formal writing only needs to be used in a formal setting (essays, science paper, textbook, etc) Writing fiction is very informal, go for you hearts desire.

dont let a royal road reader see what you said!

JordanIda · 2026-05-07T01:01:26+0100

this like kreative speling. no ""rules"" in fictions,,
, so "just do whutever" no one carez

MFontana · 2026-05-07T07:30:20+0100

laccoff_mawning said:
So I wanted to write a line where multiple people say the same thing at once. A quick google search suggests I should use a dialogue tag to convey this information. To give the example in my own work, it would read something like this:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison, before vanishing in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

But I remember reading (in probably a translation on NU or somewhere.) a similar situation, but instead of using a dialogue tag, they used double-double quotes:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!"" The four other heroes vanish in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

And I very much prefer it. I think it makes the story flow just slightly better. In this example it's hardly noticeable, but imagine if I didn't have an action after the quote, which feels pretty common if you want to have a crowd of people exclaim in surprise. Secondly, it tells me multiple people are speaking at once even before I reach the dialogue tag, rather than letting me think it's only one person speaking until I reach the dialogue tag.

Look at the same example without the group action:

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison.

The woman in the blue hair speaks to her teammates. "You go after the others. I'll handle this one."

""Right!""

The downside that I see is that it might look odd if you used single quotes for normal dialogue, since a double-single quote might just look like a double quote. I guess you could do a quadruple-single quote, maybe?

'Hey! Does a quadruple-single quote work?'

''''Huh?!''''

So here's my questions:
1. Have you seen a double-double quote used before for this purpose?
2. Do you think it's clear enough using a double quote to represent a crowd speaking at once.
3. What do you think about it in general? Which method do you prefer/use, if you've encountered this before?

To the best of my knowledge, the double-use of quotes isn't something that is a correct form of English grammar.
The grammatically correct way to write the sentence is as you did here:

"Right!" The four other heroes shout in unison, before vanishing in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan

So as far as I'm concerned the other examples are just grammatically wrong, and shouldn't be used to express dialogue line.
The double-quotes are used to express dialogue, single quotes for thoughts or quoted segments of dialogue (based on context).
Then, after the dialogue line, you have clearly articulated who is speaking that line of dialogue (in this case multiple characters).

laccoff_mawning · 2026-05-07T09:45:39+0100

LiteraryWho said:
If you really want to get "this is a crowd speaking" front and center in the readers mind, you can put the action of the group ahead of what they're saying. e.g. "The four look at me as one and yelled, 'Right.'"

This is good. So the examples would become:

The four other heroes shout in unison, "Right!"

The four other heroes shout in unison, "Right!" Then they vanish in pursuit of the Yellow Rat Clan.

The downside is, in the case of including the action, it feels even more clunky. The one without the action feels good, though.

triflight said:
Unlike everyone else it seems, I have seen this before, I think only in translations though. I wonder if it's some remnant of translating from Chinese

Anyways, I think the double quotes look best if the speech is by itself as it is in example 2.

I guess it's a lot rarer than I thought. That, or maybe it's just so inconsequential that nobody notices.

The main reason I'm thinking of adding them here is consistency. If I do choose to use it for group speech by itself, it feels inconsistent if I don't choose to use it for all group speech.

Piisfun said:
Use three sets of quotations, not two.

This only works properly if you used curved quotations with slight spacing between them; it just looks like a typo otherwise.

That's interesting.

But isn't point 1. enough to make it clearly not a typo?

MFontana said:
Then, after the dialogue line, you have clearly articulated who is speaking that line of dialogue

This is the main part of the problem, in my opinion. For normal dialogue, you don't articulate who's speaking unless you need to because it's usually obvious from context. If we look at the second set of examples (w/o the action after the dialogue) I've needed to spend an entire 7 words to convey the same amount of information as using a thicker set of quotation marks. That's a lot of pointless words.

To be fair, it's probably a rare enough case where it's not worth it's own special format, since the confusion of not being familiar with it is probably worse than the 7 extra words.

Multiple people saying the same thing at once: thoughts about double-double quotes?

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