This is a bit of an odd one as the word in question is not English, it's Italian. "puttana." I have been advised that this should be capitalised, but I am not convinced. Dick watched helplessly as Theo's companion grabbed Suzie's upper arms and held her while Theo resumed his groping. At one point his hand went under her dress and between her legs. She gasped and spat in his face. Theo slapped her hard and cursed, "puttana." Spinning her round he shoved her into the cell opposite Dick and slammed her window shut. Then he came over to Dick's cell and grinned in at him. Lifting his hand he sniffed at his forefingers, grinned again and slammed that window shut as well.
In this case, it should be capitalized by the rules of English punctuation. Since it is the first word of the 'sentence' in dialog, it should be capitalized.
Is the confusion here that you aren't thinking of "puttana" as being actual dialogue? I ask because there is a bit of an international disagreement on what a speech mark and quote marks looks like. I've seen people use " as quotation marks which looks fundamentally wrong to me, because that's a speech mark, and ' is a quote mark, or an inverted comma if you so desire, but not a speech mark. My point is that theoretically you might use " " to indicate an inline quote as you might see in an academic work and that might be your problem. For example: Stephenson concluded that '...those who drink tea without milk are both subhuman in the literal, genetic sense and are substantially worse than average in bed'; a result that has been repeated more than a dozen times over the past decade. In this context then the quote is not speech (obviously) and is not a sentence in it's own right and in that case it doesn't take a capital. And if you did the American thing and put your quotes in speech marks (instead of quote marks), then it would look similar to what you are doing and could potentially be correct. But in fiction we don't quote like that. Even if you are directly quoting in fiction you don't need to show your sources and thus there's no need to indicate it. If it's literally the word that he's saying it then it must be a capital because dialogue is treated as it's own sentence and thus follows the normal rules. You could use the narration to do the same thing which wouldn't need a capital. That would be something like Theo slapped her hard and called her a puttana. That would be fine. But written as you have it now it seems pretty clear that it's leading into literal dialogue and there doesn't seem to be any way in it's present form it couldn't take a capital letter. To take another example: Dave screamed obscenities. "Cunt!" is correct. Edit - Puttana means whore doesn't it?
technically by itself yes however when used as ... 'Figlio di puttana' -- literal translation is son of a whore/prostitute, however, its colloquial meaning would be a son of a bitch. where as 'Puttana della miseria' -- literal translation is whore of misery and is usually used in exasperation i.e you miserable whore or you miserable bitch. It is usually used in reference to situations vs. persons che cazzo voi e una puttana -- literal: what the frack do you want she's a whore... i.e what did you expect she's a fracking whore
Having read the paragraph would it be, in your opinion, more authentic to use 'Puttana della miseria' rather than just the single word?
the way you are using is correct. puttana della miseria would be much more situational ... Johnny was late to work this morning and in a rush when the tire blew out "puttana della miseria" he cursed pulling the car over to the side of the road. Even when used in a convo and directed at a person ... Jimmy was looking at the empty fuel gauge, "Puttana della miseria how many do I have to tell you to put gas in the car? " the way you are using it is much more direct as in ... you bitch/whore. if he was exasperated because she refused for the umpteenth time to do something or kept doing something she wasn't supposed to then perhaps. but it would be more after the fact, ie. he glared at her as he hung up the phone with the client "putanna della miseria you just cost me another client" it can also from a situational perspective be aimed in a masculine form he glared at him as he hung up the phone with the client "putanna della miseria you just cost me another client"
an alternative to just using Puttana is figlia di puttana which would translate as literal: daughter of a whore but colloquially as you bitch ... puttana by itself being the shortened version http://www.wordsense.eu/figlia_di_puttana/
