Question tag —"he is good", quoth the boy...

[man of manners]

Theoretically, isn't it true that the question tag suitable for this sentence ("He is good', quoth the boy.") as a whole is "didn't he?"?

 

[GoesStation]

Theoretically, isn't it true that the question tag suitable for this sentence ("He is good', quoth the boy.") as a whole is "didn't he?"?

No question tag is suitable for that statement because nobody who has lived in the last couple of centuries would say such a thing. If anyone used the obsolete quoth, then didn't he? would be suitable.

 

[emsr2d2]

The original word order was a little unnatural for a question tag. I am going to replace "quoth" with "said" in order to make a modern, natural sentence. I would expect to see:

The boy said "He is good", didn't he?

The original word order would result in:

"He is good", said the boy, didn't he?

That doesn't sound natural.

 

[man of manners]

No question tag is suitable for that statement because nobody who has lived in the last couple of centuries would say such a thing.

I know it's obsolete but not when used humorously. And from Wiktionary, I quoted "(obsolete except in past tense quoth) To say.

Verily, methinks.

You are doing well in Old English.

The original word order was a little unnatural for a question tag.

I feel it is unnatural too. But I asked about the question tag when used theoretically, perhaps, in a special/rather specific context or to give a humorous flavour to the context/occasion.

 

[emsr2d2]

You seem to be mixing up "unnatural" with "humorous". This is not the first time that we have said that something is unnatural or unlikely and you have then asked what we would think of it if it was said humorously or sarcastically (or something similar). It usually really doesn't make any difference how one says something. For a native speaker, something is either grammatical or it's not, it's natural or it's not, it's humorous or it's not.

 

[man of manners]

You seem to be mixing up "unnatural" with "humorous".

I am not. I read the label "humorous" in the Oxford Learner's Dictionary. This is the reason for all I have said. I also believe that its being humorous is because of its being odd/unnatural.
You can see it in the Oxford Dictionary: http://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/quoth?q=quoth

 

[Tdol]

It can be used jocularly, and I would use the didn't he question tag with it, but it is a pretty lame usage and would rarely actually be amusing.