RE: Punctuation question

[GRONNIGER@HARVEY.BAKERU.EDU]

I have a book titled *The Handbook of Good English" by Edward D. Johnson.
It gives fairly straight forward recommendations regarding the use of the
question mark and the comma:

"The question mark should not be used with the comma. This causes a problem
when the question mark ends a quotation and the sentence continues. *He asked,
'Why me?' which seemed an odd question* seems underpuntuated, because if the 
quotation were not a question a comma would signal both the end of the 
quotation and the beginning of the second clause. . . .  An exception is
sometimes made when the question mark actually has no function in the sentence
but is part of a title:  *His first poem, titled 'Why Me?,' was dedicated to
his mother.*   (pages 146-47)

Hope this helps,
Sally Gronniger
Learning Resource Center
Baker University
Baldwin City, KS