Hybrid quotation forms in Dickens

Quotation phenomena (or q forms) are «stretches of direct quotation which cannot be direct- ly classified as direct speech because of the way in which they occur inside other non-direct st&wp (Speech, Thought and Writing Presentation) categories» (Semino, Short, 2004, p. 54). Though more frequently found in journalistic prose than in fiction, they are extremely com- mon in Dickens’s fictional work. This article explores Dickens’s use of the complementiser that to introduce the q form clause. It is argued that Dickens’s use of this hybrid form in his fiction may have originated in his reporting of legal depositions in 1829-1831. Its stylistic effect is to turn the journalistic ‘reportable quotation’ into a ‘commentable proposition’, bringing other speaking characters and narrators into the speech event and drawing his readers in to share their perspective. Dickens thus uses this hybrid Q Form as a device to position his readers as participants in a conversational story and involves them more closely in its telling.