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Should a question mark appear at the end of a question, and before the second quotation mark?

An example is:

"How are you feeling today," he asked.

I'm getting conflicting advice.

GileBrt
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Jan
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  • Answered at Punctuation of direct speech, edge cases, in particular my answer: "Where you're reporting a trailing-off of speech, or some other ending, the punctuation mark isn't a full-stop so it doesn't become a comma." – Andrew Leach Aug 17 '13 at 17:53
  • Punctuation in reported speech should report the speech, not hew to artificial conventions. The ending of a Wh-question is a full-stop; it's indistinguishable from a period in speech. The end rise of intonation only occurs on Yes/No questions, not on Wh-questions. So there should be a question mark before the end quotation mark -- the quote marks the end of speech, and the full-stop intonation is part of the speech. – John Lawler Aug 17 '13 at 18:21
  • @JohnLawler What's a Wh-question? One beginning "Which/What"? Are you saying that questions only need question marks when the (expected) answer is Yes/No? So "What is your native language?" shouldn't have a "?" at the end? – TrevorD Aug 17 '13 at 19:35
  • No, I'm saying that if one is reporting speech, and the speech is a question, then it should be marked as a question. I.e, question mark, not comma; and question mark before close quote. I only mentioned "full-stop" intonation because it was in the previous comment. – John Lawler Aug 17 '13 at 20:32
  • @TrevorD English has more wh- words than just those. – tchrist Aug 18 '13 at 00:51

1 Answers1

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The correct form is

"How are you feeling today?" he asked.

This is because the part in quotation marks is a question, so it should have a question mark, but the entire sentence is simply a statement.

Doorknob
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