In fiction, when a character talks for a long time in 1st person, does every paragraph get enclosed in quotes?

Question

In fiction writing, can I separate the text with three asterisks?

"Joe, tell us about your life."

***

I was born in New York.

When I was ten, I played ball.

As a teenager, I dated infrequently.

(If this narration goes on for pages, do I enclose each paragraph in quotes?)

Answer 1

You don't enclose the paragraph in quotes, but you use a quote to open the paragraph, then leave off the closing quotation mark at the end of the paragraph and start the next paragraph with a quotation mark.
You do this until you come to the final paragraph, and only then do you put the closing quotation marks in.
The quotation mark at the beginning of the paragraph indicates that it is a continuation from the paragraph before.
Some recent authors have dropped the quotation marks, and just written the narration as ordinary text. Personally, that seems confusing, but perhaps that's just because it's not something I'm accustomed to seeing.
Just in passing -- if you're writing a story, try not to have a first person narrative that goes on and on. Break it up with action, with description, with any kind of a comment from another person, or somehow or other, interrupt that stream of talk. It's deadly dull to read.

Answer 2

The use of asterisks isn't standard for writing.

Each speech is *enclosed* by quotes. You don't put the end quote until the speech is finished. However, you do put another quote at the beginning of each new paragraph within the same quote.

"I was born in New York. When I was ten, I played ball.

"As a teenager, I dated infrequently."

Answer 3

Well, I think the right version would have quotes.

Now, what kind of fiction is it? A novel? A play?

As for the three asterisks, I don't think they are used to separate what one character says and what another one does. They are used to separate the text when there's a change of time or place (of course characters too).

Ok, I think this would be easier to clarify if I had some feedback, so I'll give you my MSN account: [e-mail].

Oh, one more thing... why have you written each sentence on a different line?