How would I punctuate the bold portion?
"Who are you?" she asked.
"Wait," I replied, "did you just ask me Who are you?"
I would use the following:
"Wait," I replied, "did you just ask me, 'Who are you'?"
-
Comma before the quote
-
Quoted with single quotation marks (instead of italics, which I'd consider another option)
-
Closing quotation mark before the question mark
-
Only one question mark (for my question, not the quoted one)
Is this correct?
Best Answer
Here's the correct version:
"Wait," I replied, "did you just ask me, 'Who are you?' "
Some things to notice:
1. The statement being quoted is a question, so you need the question mark in the embedded quotation marks. You don't need a second question mark. A sentence can have only one end punctuation mark.
2. The comma before the embedded quotation, which follows standard format for introducing a quotation.
3. The space between the single and double quotation marks at the end.
If I were to revise this, I would write this: "Wait," I said. "Did you just ask me who I am?"