Learn English – Who is he? Who he is

colloquial-language

Can we say …

"Do you know who is he?"

To me, it sounds very unnatural and grammatically incorrect.
Though, I think we can say …

"Do you know? Who is he?"

in conversation.

Is that right?

Best Answer

You have it right. As a single question, we would write:

Do you know who he is? (not, Do you know who is he?)

However, the way you have punctuated these six words makes the wording acceptable in your second example. The first question ("Do you know?") is a lead-in to the second ("Who is he?").

When written that way, I imagine the speaker being rather excited. Perhaps there is a lot of buzz in the street as a celebrity is walking by. Someone might excitedly say to a friend, "Do you know? Who is he?"

I think in a more calm and collected state of mind, the question order is likely to be reversed:

Who is he? Do you know?

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