Direct and indirect speech

Direct speech is noted directly in the words used by the original speaker without any changes of tense or pronouns. Quotations marks are used to signal direct speech.

She looked at me and said: "This is my family." OR "This is my family," she said, looking at me.

Indirect speech is a structure in which we report what someone said by making it part of our own sentence so the word order, tenses, pronouns and other words may be different from the original utterance. A sentence of indirect speech is called also reported speech as we report about it.

The tense in reported speech "moves back" from the original tense of the speaker.

"I feel dreadful." -> She said she felt dreadful.

"I am reading a book." -> She said that she was reading a book.

"I was very good at history at school. -> She said she had been very good at history at school.

"I have just become a vegetarian." -> She said that she had just become a vegetarian.

Changes in modals

WILL -> WOULD                 "I will come, I promise." -> She promised she would come.

MAY -> MIGHT             CAN -> COULD                   MUST -> HAD TO

Modals that are already in this form do not change in reported speech.

"You should see the doctor." -> She said I should see the doctor.

                                                     OR She advised me to see the doctor.

If we change the tense, speaker's words were true when they were spoken but not necessarily true when they were reported. Therefore, we do no move tenses when the situation is still true or still relevant.

"I study Japanese," she said. -> She said that he studies Japanese. = she is still studying it.

                                                       She said that he studied Japanese. = she may have stopped already

Changes in other words: an hour ago = an hour before, last year = the previous year, there = here, yesterday = the day before, tomorrow = the following day, next month = the following month

Common verbs used in reported speech: admit, mention, protest, complain, realise, explain, suggest, advise, persuade, warn, remind, tell, order, ask, remind, threaten, refuse, offer, agree, promise, deny, recommend, propose, apologise...

Reported questions are not real questions. The word order is the same as for statements and the reported sentence does not have the question mark.

YES-NO questions are usually introduced by IF/WHETHER (He asked me if I had ever worked abroad.)

To report WH-questions we use wh-word followed by the reported clause. (He asked me how long I had been working in the shopping centre. The doctor asked me when I had first felt the pain.")