In other words: should it be “Guess what?” or “Guess what!”? Or does the correct usage depend on the context and intent of the speaker?
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If "Guess what" is to be a complete sentence, it's unequivocally an imperative one. Logically, if not linguistically, the reply has to be a question itself…
…unless the responder actually plans to guess. |
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I think it can vary by speaker. My inclination would be to use "guess what!" when the speaker keeps on speaking, and "guess what?" when the speaker pauses to accept guesses, thus:
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I believe it should actually be
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I think it is a command rather than question. The speaker is forcing / telling the listener to guess correctly about the fact in their context of speach. Because he knows the fact and now he is putting a puzzle in excitement in front of listener to guess it right.. Guess what! |
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Logically it seems that it is an imperative statement. But if you do a google search for "guess what" or a COCA search for "guess what" you'll see that it is quite frequently written as a question. In addition to the two cases mentioned by Hellion it is also used in other ways, such as
In these examples it's neither an imperative nor a question. |
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I know this question was posted a long time ago, but I feel the need to chime in. In regards to Hellion's response: "Guess what" would never be punctuated with a question mark. My reason for saying that is because of the inflection. Listen to how statements and questions are said. A statement (such as "I am so happy.") starts high in tone and ends lower in tone. A question (such as "How are you doing?") starts lower and ends higher. Inflection always dictates how a sentence is punctuated. When someone says "Guess what", it never sounds like a question. It is a command; you are telling someone to do something. Say a couple of short questions out loud, listen to the inflection, then say "Guess what" last and you will see what I'm talking about.
I think a lot of people punctuate this sentence incorrectly for two reasons:
A good example as to why I think this is the case lies in another sentence that gets punctuated incorrectly: "I wonder what he is thinking." A lot of people would punctuate this with a question mark because "wonder" implies thought and the word "what" is being used. But, this is a statement. You are saying that you're doing something (wondering), not asking a question. Similarly, listen to the inflection in this sentence. It starts high and ends low—the opposite of how a question sounds. |
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