History: Quotes without a speaker specified

Source of version: 1 (current)

((The Book)) shows ''sei'' being used in conjunction with ''lu...li'u'', not instead of it. This is good, because otherwise, after a sentence marked with ''((sei))'', how can you tell whether the next sentence is narration or a continuation of their utterance? So, a quote __with__ a speaker specified should be ''lu...sei...li'u'', and a quote without a speaker would be that without the ''sei'' - in other words, simply quoted text. The result is a bare sumti in the sentence, perhaps observing the existence of that quote. (If instead you choose to not put dialogue in quotes - as in the script to a play - then I assume unmarked sentences would belong to the most recently named speaker, and narration (or stage directions) would be in ''to'i...toi''.) ((rab.spir)) * That's exactly what I did towards the end of the lessons. In fact, I went one further, I think: .i la djiotis lu coi li'u . Two disconnected sumti. Because you know very well how they are connected already. -- nitcion. (I disagree. ''sei'' in itself is merely metadiscourse-- whether or not the speaker changes, is not specified. If a new sentence begins, it is of course a continuation of the previous discourse, unless explicitly changed by ''ni'o''. This convention for a ''draci se ciska'' is not the only one, of course, but it is workable and not un-''lobykai''. However, I have to address a mere importation of the conventional drama text conventions, which utilize italics and line spaces to convey metadiscourse information. In Lojban, such things __ought to be made explicit__. An empty line is not a unit of information in Lojban. Italics are explicit and refer only to a change in typeface. I realize that any other method will seem clunky and unnatural, but that's just how it is. The drama is not a literary form native to Lojbanistan.) So how is this disagreeing? What's not explicit about ''to'i...toi''? Or if you're referring to the ''lu...sei...li'u'' form of quotes, a new sentence would certainly continue the discourse because it would still be inside the ''lu...li'u''! But what I'm saying is that if a bare quote with no ''sei'' occurs, the speaker is ''zo'e'' and (as in English text) is most likely the person who spoke the utterance before last. * We already know tense conventions are different in narratives and discussion for Lojban ("story time"). I have no problem with a specific convention arising for Lojban drama, whereby the speaker of bare quotes is assumed to alternate. This is different to normal Lojban talk; but chained quotes as dramatic text is not normal Lojban talk. -- nitcion