Reported speech - Level II

When communicating, there are times when you have to talk about what another person has said before. This is called reporting, very common both in written and oral communication, but also in some written genres like journalistic texts and fiction

Reported speech, also called indirect speech to separate it from direct speech (or the normal way of communicating), is an advanced form of sentence elaboration that students of English learn once their ability with the language advances enough, as it is somewhat complex due to many changes, or backshifts, in the verbs and vocabulary used.

In this post we will learn about reported speech at level II, so the explanation is in English and the examples shown have an intermediate difficulty.

Uses of the reported speech

We use reported speech for:

1. Telling someone what another individual has said.

• Talia told us that she was pregnant with John’s child that morning.
• He said he was going to assist to the job interview at twelve o’clock on Friday.
• The veterinarian informed the family that dogs weren’t allowed to eat chocolate.
• Sally said she had a vision while plucking off a flower’s petals.

2. Referencing events that the subject did not experience in person.

• Martha said that Tommy had been busy in the garage all day.
• Kenny told us that Eric was sick in the stomach from eating bad food the day before.
• The tour guide explained how Anne Frank had lived her last days with her family.
• Elena wondered how Angelica was working all night in her science project all alone.

Structure of the reported speech

Direct speech reporting usually quotes the exact phrasing someone said at any moment, which uses quotation marks.

• Police officer: “A bunch of teenagers and a talking dog captured the masked criminal”.
• Mom: “Stop playing MOBA games because they are affecting your sleep schedule!”
• Carl: “Killing people is my least favourite thing to do”.
• Teacher: “Are you studying hard enough to pass my subject this term?”

When we use reported speech, we're talking about what someone else said, but not using their exact words. Instead, we're summarizing or paraphrasing what they said, so we have to make some changes in the sentences:

• Quotation marks are dropped: This just means we don't use the "..." to show someone's exact words anymore. Instead, we're going to tell what they said in our own words.
• Reported sentence becomes a subordinated clause: This means we make the quoted sentence a part of our own sentence. It's like we're putting what they said inside our sentence.
• Reporting clause with its own reporting verb: This is the part where we introduce what was said. We use our own words to say who said it and what they said.
• Sometimes we use "that" to link them, but we can often omit it: When we're adding what someone else said into our sentence, we might use "that" to connect the two parts. But sometimes we don't need to use "that" at all.
• The verb tense changes: This is called backshift. It means that when we're reporting what someone said, we might need to change the tense of the verbs to show that we're talking about something that happened in the past. Find more about reported speech backshifts here!

So, in simple terms, when we're using reported speech, we're basically telling someone else's words in our own way, adding it into our sentence and adjusting the tense of the verbs to fit the situation. The structure for doing this is the following one:

Subject + reporting verb + (that) + reported sentence

• The police officer said a bunch of teenagers and a talking dog had captured the masked criminal.
• Mom demanded that I stopped playing MOBA games because they were affecting my sleep schedule.
• Carl explained that killing people was his least favourite thing to do.
• The teacher asked me if I was studying hard enough to pass her subject in the current term.

As you may have notice, the reporting verb may change. The most common are said and tell, usually done for statements, but there are other verbs for different actions:

Statements: say, tell, comment, inform, explain, argue...

• Alejandro commented that Pablo would arrive late to class.
• Paul said that he was moving out of Carl’s house that night.

Commands and requests: command, order, warn, tell, ask, advice, invite, beg, forbid...

• The sergeant ordered us to stay in the same room.
• My mom has forbidden us from using our phones during dinner.

Suggestions: suggest, prefer, insist, recommend, advice, propose...

• Andy insisted in returning home early to not miss the match on TV.
• My daughter proposed that we could go to the cinema after lunch.

Questions. ask, want to know, inquire, wonder about/if, whether…

• Sarah asked Jareth where her brother was taken by the goblins.
• Nicholas wondered about Martha’s results of the previous test in Maths.

Note: When transforming questions into reported speech, sometimes you can also use in the sentence the Wh- particles used, like when, where, how, etc.