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Reported Speech

Reported speech is used to tell someone else what another person said. When reporting a statement in the past tense, the tenses of the reported speech are typically changed. For questions, the question is changed to a normal positive sentence by removing the question structure and keeping the question word. Yes/no questions are reported using "if" instead of changing to a statement.

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Leticia Fornaciari
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57 views3 pages

Reported Speech

Reported speech is used to tell someone else what another person said. When reporting a statement in the past tense, the tenses of the reported speech are typically changed. For questions, the question is changed to a normal positive sentence by removing the question structure and keeping the question word. Yes/no questions are reported using "if" instead of changing to a statement.

Uploaded by

Leticia Fornaciari
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Reported Speech

When do we use reported speech? Sometimes someone says a sentence, for example "I'm going to the cinema
tonight". Later, maybe we want to tell someone else what the first person said. Here's how it works:
We use a reporting verb like 'say' or 'tell'. If this verb is in the present tense, it's easy. We just put 'she says' and
then the sentence.

 Direct speech: I like ice cream.


 Reported speech: She says she likes ice cream.
We don't need to change the tense, though probably we do need to change the 'person' from 'I' to 'she', for example.
We also may need to change words like 'my' and 'your'. On the other hand, if the reporting verb is in the past tense,
then usually we change the tenses in the reported speech:

 Direct speech: I like ice cream.


 Reported speech: She said she liked ice cream.
Tense Direct Speech Reported Speech
present simple "I like ice cream." She said (that) she liked ice cream.
present "I am living in London." She said she was living in London.
continuous
past simple "I bought a car." She said she had bought a car
OR
She said she bought a car.
past continuous "I was walking along the She said she had been walking along the
street." street.
present perfect "I haven't seen Julie." She said she hadn't seen Julie.

past perfect* "I had taken English She said she had taken English lessons
lessons before." before.
will "I'll see you later." She said she would see me later.

would* "I would help, but…" She said she would help but...

can "I can speak perfect She said she could speak perfect English.
English."
could* "I could swim when I She said she could swim when she was four.
was four."
shall "I shall come later." She said she would come later.

should* "I should call my She said she should call her mother.
mother."
might* "I might be late." She said she might be late.
must "I must study at the She said she must study at the weekend. OR
weekend." She said she had to study at the weekend.

* doesn't change.
Occasionally, we don't need to change the present tense into the past if the information in direct speech is still true
(but this is only for things which are general facts, and even then usually we like to change the tense):
Direct speech: The sky is blue.
Reported speech: She said that the sky is/was blue
Reported Questions
So now you have no problem with making reported speech from positive and negative sentences. But how about
questions?

 Direct speech: Where do you live?


 Reported speech: She asked me where I lived.
How can we make the reported speech here? In fact, it's not so different from reported statements. The tense
changes are the same, and we keep the question word. The very important thing though is that, once we tell the
question to someone else, it isn't a question any more. So we need to change the grammar to a normal positive
sentence.

 Direct speech: Where is Julie?


 Reported speech: She asked me where Julie was.
The direct question is the present simple of 'be'. We make the question form of the present simple of be by inverting
(changing the position of) the subject and verb. So, we need to change them back before putting the verb into the
past simple. Here are some more examples:
Direct Question Reported Question
"Where is the Post Office, please?" She asked me where the Post Office was.
"What are you doing?" She asked me what I was doing.
"Who was that fantastic man?" She asked me who that fantastic man had been.

So much for 'wh' questions. But, what if you need to report a 'yes / no' question? We don't have any question words
to help us. Instead, we use 'if':

 Direct speech: Do you like chocolate?


 Reported speech: She asked me if I liked chocolate.
No problem? Here are a few more examples:
Direct Question
Reported Question
"Do you love me?" He asked
me if I loved him.
"Have you ever been to Mexico?" She asked me if I had ever been to Mexico.
"Are you living here?" She asked me if I was
living here.

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