Speech
Direct
Speech / Quoted Speech
Saying exactly what someone has said is
called direct speech (sometimes called quoted speech)
Here what a person says appears within
quotation marks ("...") and should be word for word.
Indirect speech (sometimes called reported
speech), doesn't use quotation marks to enclose what the person said and it
doesn't have to be word for word.
When reporting speech the tense usually
changes. This is because when we use reported speech, we are usually talking
about a time in the past (because obviously the person who spoke originally
spoke in the past). The verbs therefore usually have to be in the past too.
Tense change
As a rule when you report something someone
has said you go back a tense: (the tense on the left changes to the tense on
the right):
Direct
speech
|
Indirect
speech
|
|
Present simple
She said, "It's cold." |
›
|
Past simple
She said it was cold. |
Present continuous
She said, "I'm teaching English online." |
›
|
Past continuous
She said she was teaching English online. |
Present perfect simple
She said, "I've been on the web since 1999." |
›
|
Past perfect simple
She said she had been on the web since 1999. |
Present perfect continuous
She said, "I've been teaching English for seven years." |
›
|
Past perfect continuous
She said she had been teaching English for seven years. |
Past simple
She said, "I taught online yesterday." |
›
|
Past perfect
She said she had taught online yesterday. |
Past continuous
She said, "I was teaching earlier." |
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|
Past perfect continuous
She said she had been teaching earlier. |
Past perfect
She said, "The lesson had already started when he arrived." |
›
|
Past perfect
NO CHANGE - She said the lesson had already started when he arrived. |
Past perfect continuous
She said, "I'd already been teaching for five minutes." |
›
|
Past perfect continuous
NO CHANGE - She said she'd already been teaching for five minutes. |
Modal verb forms
also sometimes change:
Direct speech
|
Indirect speech
|
|
will
She said, "I'll teach English online tomorrow." |
›
|
would
She said she would teach English online tomorrow. |
can
She said, "I can teach English online." |
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|
could
She said she could teach English online. |
must
She said, "I must have a computer to teach English online." |
›
|
had to
She said she had to have a computer to teach English online. |
shall
She said, "What shall we learn today?" |
›
|
should
She asked what we should learn today. |
may
She said, "May I open a new browser?" |
›
|
might
She asked if she might open a new browser. |
Time change
If the reported sentence
contains an expression of time, you must change it to fit in with the time of
reporting.
For example we need to
change words like here and yesterday if they have different
meanings at the time and place of reporting.
Expressions of time if reported on a different day
|
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this (evening)
|
›
|
that (evening)
|
|
today
|
›
|
yesterday ...
|
|
these (days)
|
›
|
those (days)
|
|
now
|
›
|
then
|
|
(a week) ago
|
›
|
(a week) before
|
|
last weekend
|
›
|
the weekend before last /
the previous weekend
|
|
here
|
›
|
there
|
|
next (week)
|
›
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the following (week)
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tomorrow
|
›
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the next/following day
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