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Reported Speech

The document discusses how to report what someone else said in indirect or reported speech. It explains that tenses, word order, and pronouns may change compared to direct speech. For example, present simple verbs usually change to past tense, and pronouns change to reflect the new subjects. It provides examples of reporting statements, questions, orders, and speech acts using different tenses and constructions.

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Shenali Nupehewa
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50 views

Reported Speech

The document discusses how to report what someone else said in indirect or reported speech. It explains that tenses, word order, and pronouns may change compared to direct speech. For example, present simple verbs usually change to past tense, and pronouns change to reflect the new subjects. It provides examples of reporting statements, questions, orders, and speech acts using different tenses and constructions.

Uploaded by

Shenali Nupehewa
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Do you know how to report what somebody else said?

In reported speech the tenses, word-order and pronouns may be different from the
original sentence.

Reported speech (1)

When we report someone’s words we can do it in two ways. We can use direct


speech with quotation marks (“I work in a bank”), or we can use reported
speech (He said he worked in a bank.)

In reported speech the tenses, word-order and pronouns may be different from those
in the original sentence.

Present simple and present continuous tenses

 Direct speech:  “I travel a lot in my job”  Reported speech: He said that he travelled a
lot in his job.

The present simple tense (I travel) usually changes to the past simple (he travelled) in
reported speech.

 Direct speech:  “Be quiet. The baby’s sleeping.”  Reported speech: She told me to be
quiet because the baby was sleeping.

The present continuous usually changes to the past continuous.

NB:

 “I work in Italy”  Reported speech: He told me that he works in Italy.

It isn’t always necessary to change the tense. If something is still true now –
he still works in Italy – we can use the present simple in the reported sentence.

Past simple and past continuous tenses

 Direct speech:  “We lived in China for 5 years.” Reported speech:  She told me they had
lived in China for 5 years.

The past simple tense (we lived) usually changes to the past perfect (they had lived) in
reported speech.
 Direct speech:  “I was walking down the road when I saw the accident.” Reported
speech:  He told me he’d been walking down the road when he’d seen the accident.

The past continuous usually changes to the past perfect continuous.

Perfect tenses

 Direct speech:  “They’ve always been very kind to me”.  Reported speech: She said
they’d always been very kind to her.

The present perfect tense (have always been) usually changes to the past perfect tense
(had always been).

 Direct speech:  “They had already eaten when I arrived”  Reported speech: He said
they’d already eaten when he’d arrived.

The past perfect tense does not change in reported speech.

Remember that in reported speech we usually change the tense of the direct statement.
The present simple tense changes to the past simple, the past simple changes to the
past perfect and so on.

Here are some other points to consider.

‘Can’ and ‘will’

 Direct speech:  “I can’t remember his name.”  Reported speech: She said she couldn’t
remember his name.

‘Can’ and ‘can’t’ in direct speech change to ‘could’ and ‘couldn’t’ in reported speech.

 Direct speech:  “I’ll be there for 3 weeks.”  Reported speech: He told me he’d be there
for 3 weeks.

‘Will’ and ‘won’t’ in direct speech change to ‘would’ and ‘wouldn’t’ in reported speech.

Other modal verbs

 Direct speech:  “You could be right.” Reported speech: I said that he could be right.
 Direct speech: “You must call me.”  Reported speech: She said that I must call her.

Other modal verbs don’t change in reported speech.

Reporting orders, requests and advice

 Direct speech:  “Sit down and shut up!”  Reported speech: The teacher told me to sit
down and shut up.
 Direct speech:  “Can you hold this for me please?” Reported speech:  He asked me to
hold it.
 Direct speech:  “You should do more exercise.” Reported speech: He advised me to do
more exercise.

Orders, request and advice can be reported using an infinitive.

Reporting verbs

There are a number of verbs that we use to report statements. These can make your
speech and writing more interesting than simply reporting every word of the direct
speech.

 Direct speech:  “It wasn’t me who broke the window.” > He denied breaking the
window.
 Direct speech:  “I’ll help you if you want” > She offered to help.

There are a number of verbs that can be used to report. They


include: promise, claim, suggest, advise, refuse, argue, confirm and others.

When we report what people say, we usually change the tense of the verbs to reflect
that we are reporting – not giving direct speech. This pattern is followed when we
report questions and there are also other important changes between direct questions
and reported questions.

Yes/no questions

 Direct question:  “Do you like working in teams?” Reported question:  He asked if I liked
working in teams.

When we report yes/no questions we use ‘if’ or ‘whether’.

 Direct question: “Did you enjoy the party?”  Reported question: She asked me whether
I’d enjoyed the party.

The tense of the verb changes as it does in reported speech but we don’t use
auxiliary verbs. The word order is the same as in an affirmative sentence.

Questions with a question word

 Direct question:  “What time does the train leave?”  Reported question: He asked what
time the train left.

When there is a question word (what, where, why, who, when, how) we use that
question word in the reported question but there is no auxiliary verb and the word
order is like an affirmative sentence (‘what time the train left’ not He asked me what
time did the train leave.)

Look at some more examples:


 Direct question:  “Who did you see?”
 Reported question:  She asked me who I’d seen.

 Direct question:  “Where did you go to school?”


 Reported question:  He asked me where I’d gone to school.

 Direct question:  “Why are you crying?”


 Reported question:  She asked him why he was crying.

Notice that the reported questions do not have a question mark at the end.

Indirect questions

Similar to reported questions are indirect questions.

 Can you tell me  what time the train leaves? NOT Can you tell me what time does
the train leave?
 I’d love to know what he said to her. NOT I’d love to know what did he say to her.

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