REPORTED SPEECH

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REPORTED SPEECH

Reported speech is used to tell somebody else what a person told you.

There is usually a change of tense when you tell somebody what another person told you before. This is called "backshift".

Reported (or

indirect speech) is when we say what was said before.

You

said that you loved Chris.

There are four things you

need to remember to change.

1. The tense. If the events

are now in the past, you need to change the verbs to the past forms.

present

simple

changes

to

past

simple

present

continuous

past

continuous

present

perfect

past

perfect

will

would

shall

should

must

had to

can

could

is

going to

was

going to

2. The pronouns. Words like

'I' and 'his' and 'they' will all change, because the people speaking have

changed.

3. Some time expressions. If

the time has changed, words like 'yesterday' are meaningless. Instead, we say

the day/week before or the previous day/week

the following day/week or the next day/week

4. If the place has

changed, "here" should change to "there".

Example:

Direct speech: "After Robert left primary school, he grew up very quickly," said his mother.

Robert´s mother said that after he had left primary school, he had grown up very quickly.

There are a number of different reporting verbs in English. Here is a list of common ones, showing the structures they can take:

ACCUSE OF + ING

Mark accused Doug of deliberately forgetting to tell him about the course.

admit + ... ing

apologize for .... ing

argue for + .... ing

deny + .... ing

explain that ......

insist on . . . ing / insist that . . .

promise (somebody) that . . . . / promise to . . .

refuse to . . . (infinitive)

say that . . . .

IS SAID + THAT

suggest + .... ing

suggest + that . . .

warn (somebody) that . . . / warn (somebody) to (infinitive) or NOT + to + infinitive

TO REPORT QUESTIONS, YOU USE THE FOLLOWING FORMULA:

INDIRECT QUESTIONS