Quotations are essential in a literature essay and must be accurate. They may be brief. There are two ways of introducing them:
1) Short ones may be run into your sentence, enclosing them in quotation marks:
After hearing that Malcolm is to be Prince of Cumberland, Macbeth sees it as a threat: "That is a step/On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap". The end of the line is shown by a forward slash.
If you need to change the pronoun to make the quotation fit your sentence, use square brackets: Macbeth fears that this is a step, "On which [he] must fall down, or else o'erleap."
2) Longer quotations should start on a new line. Do not use quotation marks but indent the passage.
Macbeth hears that Malcolm is to be made Prince of Cumberland and falls into private thoughts:
The Prince of Cumberland! - That is a step
On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap,
For in my way it lies.
(Act I, sc. iv, line 48 - you do not need to give these references)
Thank you. This is extremely helpful.
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