Materi Bahasa Inggris : Reported Speech

REPORTED (= INDIRECT) SPEECH

1. If the reporting verb in the past form (said, told,...) you have to change the tense.

Direct speech	Indirect speech	Direct Speech	Indirect speech
Present simple	Past simple	go	went
Present progressive	Past progressive	am/is/are going	was/were going
Past simple	Past perfect	went	had gone
Past progressive	Past perfect progressive	was/were going	had been going
Present perfect simple	Past perfect	has/have gone	had gone
Present perfect progressive	Past perfect progressive	has/have been going	had been going
Future	Conditional I	will go	would go
Example    : Peter said: "Carol is a nice girl."
Peter said (that) Carol was a nice girl.

 2. When you form the reported speech you have to pay attention that the pronouns refer to the correct person.

Examples:	Susan said: "My parents are clever scientists."
	Susan said (that) her parents were clever scientists.
	Tom said: "I like PE best."
	Tom said (that) he liked PE best.
	They said: "We went swimming with our friends."
	They said (that) they had gone swimming with their friend.
	Betty said: "Sam told me the truth."
	Betty said (that) Sam had told her the truth.

	Direct speech	Indirect speech
She said	I - my - me	she - her - her
He said	I - my - me	he - his - him
They said	they - their - them	we - our - us

You and your:

They told her / him / me / them / us: "George loves you."

They told her / him / me / them / us (that) George loved her / him / me / them / us.

They told her / him / me / them / us: "George loves your sister."

They told her / him / me / them / us (that) George loved her / his / my / their / our sister.

They told her / him / me / them / us: "You are clever."

They told her / him / me / them / us (that) she / he / I / they / we was / were clever.

3. Expressions of time and place must also be changed.

	Direct speech	Indirect speech
Time	now	then
	today	that day
	yesterday	the day before
	tomorrow	the next / following day
	last week, month,...	the previous week, month,...
	next week, month,...	the following week, month,...
Place	here	there
	this	that
	these	those

She said: "I have already seen Carol today."
She said (that) she had already seen Carol that day.