Do I add quotes around my thoughts?

He staggered in, late as usual, his hair this way and his collar the other. His socks were as mismatched as were his principles. I thought to myself, here comes yet another disastrous sales meeting.

It seems to me too much to write :

I thought to myself 'Here comes yet another disastrous sales meeting'.

The Authorised Version deliberately did away with punctuated speech, retaining only the capital to indicate the beginning of a quote but leaving out quotation marks.

Can I therefore do the same in common writing, for my thoughts ?

I thought to myself, Here comes yet another disastrous sales meeting.

I cannot find another question on EL&U which covers this.

Solution 1:

The Handbook of Good English suggests the following:

Direct quotations of thoughts

Thoughts can be treated like other quotations and enclosed in quotation marks. They can also be italicized, without quotation marks. Both of these conventions are common. It is more common to dispense with both quotation marks and italics: Johnson thought, Now why did I say that?; Now why did I say that? he brooded.

You can find plenty of examples of each in books:

• Example with quotes
• Example with italics
• Example with both quotes and italics
• Example with neither quotes nor italics

Whatever you do, the important thing is to be consistent.