The Reported speech

1. Reported speech

I've composed a song.

She told me that she had composed a song.

2. When do we use reported speech?

When we want to express what someone has told us we have two options: direct speech or reported speech.

A sentence in reported speech will generally be introduced by a verb in the past. The most common are say and tell.

We use reported speech for three different types of sentences: statements, questions and requests or commands.

3. Reported speech for statements

When we use reported speech, we take the verb tense of the original sentence as a reference and we move it one tense back. Now we will show a table with the original verb tense and its corresponding verb tense in reported speech.

4. Reported speech for questions

When we use reported speech to express a question we also move the verb tense of the original sentence one tense back as with the statements, but the sentence no longer has the structure of the question and takes the structure of a statement. The sentence in reported speech will be introduced by the verb ask.

A question can be preceded or not by a question word (who, when...)

The particle if can be replaced by the word whether.

Below there are a few examples in different verb tenses.

5. Reported speech for requests and commands

When we use reported speech to express a request, the verb of the sentence in reported speech will be in infinitive preceded by the particle to, and will be introduced by the verb ask. The verb tell is used for commands. If the sentence is negative, we will place the particle not in front of the to.

6. Comments

There are a few things to keep in mind when using reported speech:

• In cases where the original sentence is said in the first person (I/we) it will be necessary to change the subject pronouns, object pronouns and possessive adjectives:
  
  Liz: I'll give my old records to you.

  Liz told me she would give her old records to me.

  In this example we have changed the subject I to she, since in the original sentence Liz speaks in the first person, while in reported speech we talk about what she said, so we use the third person (she). We also replace the possessive my by her for the same reason. The object pronoun you is replaced by me, since I am the one who says the sentence.

   

  Mary: The swimming pool improved its facilities.

  Mary told me that the swimming pool had improved its facilities.

  In this example we don't change either the subject or the possessive, since in this case she doesn't speak about herself in the first person in the original sentence.
• In spoken English, with the past simple and the continuous you don't tend to move the verb one tense back, that is, you don't change the verb tense:
  
  (direct) At six I was working.

  (indirect) He said that he was working at six.
• We will also have to change certain particles and expressions of time:
  

  Other changes
  Here	There
  Today	That day
  Now	Then
  Yesterday	The day before The previous day
  The day before yesterday	Two days before
  Ago	Before
  Last week	The week before The previous week
  Next year	The following year
  Tomorrow	The next day The following day
  This	That
  These	Those

7. Reported speech with reporting verbs

To introduce a sentence in reported speech, not only are the verbs ask, tell and say used, but other verbs can also be used (reporting verbs) and the way of building the sentence will vary according to them.

Below we show the different structures with some of the most common reporting verbs:

Remember!