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I am going through 'All About Particles', and came across the following two sentences:
なぜ彼がそんなことをやったか、わかりません。
どうして彼女がそんなつまらない本を読んでいるのか、不思議です。
What is the difference between using か in the first one and のか in the second? I have searched online, and のか seems to carry a sense of 'questioning the former'. Does that mean I could also use のか in the first sentence?
First of all, the meaning is the same. 'questioning the former.'
なぜ彼がそんなことをやったか、わかりません。
なぜ彼がそんなことをやったのか、わかりません。
どうして彼女がそんなつまらない本を読んでいるか、不思議です。
どうして彼女がそんなつまらない本を読んでいるのか、不思議です。
are all natural.
This is a combination of の and か. This の is called 準体言助詞, which makes a noun phrase out of a verb phrase.
「それを食べたのは、いけないことだ。」(It is bad that you ate it.)
Also, you can add か to a noun 「動物かは、分からない」(I am not sure if it is an animal.)
So, you can also add か to a noun phrase to make something similar. 「それを食べたのかは、分からない。」(I am not sure whether you ate it not.)
か itself can follow a verb phrase to make a noun questioning phrase. 「それが食べられるかを知りたい。」(I want to know if I can eat it.)
