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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/37788
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/37788
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

You're asking whether in a story narrated in first person, you can have dialogue? Of course you can. Your MC is telling the story. Why shouldn't he tell the dialogue as is - the others' words as well as his own?

Here's an example for you, From the first chapter of Jim Butcher's _Storm Front_ (the first book of the Dresden Files series).

> The new mailman, who looked like a basketball with arms and legs and a sunburned, balding head, was chuckling at the sign on the door glass. He glanced at me and hooked a thumb toward the sign. "You're kidding, right?"  
> I read the sign (people change it occasionally), and shook my head. "No, I'm serious. Can I have my mail, please."  
> "So, uh. Like parties, shows, stuff like that?" He looked past me, as though he expected to see a white tiger, or possibly some skimpily clad assistants prancing around my one-room office.  
> I sighed, not in the mood to get mocked again, and reached for the mail he held in his hand. "No, not like that. I don't do parties."  
> He held on to it, his head tilted curiously. "So what? Some kinda fortune-teller? Cards and crystal balls and things?"  
> "No," I told him. "I'm not a psychic." I tugged at the mail.  
> He held on to it. "What are you, then?"  
> "What's the sign on the door say?"  
> "It says 'Harry Dresden. Wizard.' "  
> "That's me," I confirmed.  
> "An actual wizard?" he asked, grinning, as though I should let him in on the joke. "Spells and potions? Demons and incantations? Subtle and quick to anger?"  
> "Not so subtle." I jerked the mail out of his hand and looked pointedly at his clipboard. "Can I sign for my mail please."

What you don't do in first person is tell what other characters are thinking (you can tell what your MC _thinks_ they're thinking, but that's different). Also, nothing that goes on where your MC can't know about it - in another place, while they're sleeping etc. (The MC can hear about those events second-hand.)

Original score: 1