funnybops.blogg.se - One up on wall street questions

Indirect speech: She asked me how they would get here.Direct speech: “How will they get here?”.Indirect speech: He asked us when we were leaving.Indirect speech: You asked me where they lived.Indirect speech: You asked me if they lived here.Īs you can see, in the reported version of the question, ‘do’ is eliminated because it is no longer a question, and the verb ‘live’ becomes ‘lived’.įor questions starting with question words like ‘what’, ‘where’, ‘when’, ‘who’, etc., we report the question using the question word but change the interrogative form to the affirmative form.When we report a yes/no question, we use ‘if’. There are two types of questions that we can report – questions that have a yes/no response, and questions that begin with a question word like ‘what’, ‘where’, ‘who’ etc. When you report a question you need to change the interrogative form into an affirmative sentence, putting the verb tense one step back, as with normal reported speech. Indirect speech: She said she hadn’t seen them since the previous week.Direct speech: “I haven’t seen them since last week.Indirect speech: He said it’d been raining since that afternoon.Direct speech: “It’s been raining since this afternoon.Indirect speech: You said you’d had a headache the day before yesterday.Direct speech: “I had a headache yesterday.Indirect speech: She said she was seeing her brother the following day.Direct speech: “I’m seeing my brother tomorrow.Sometimes it’s necessary to change the time expressions when you report speech, especially when you are speaking about the past and the time reference no longer applies. You told us you’d already finished the order.They told her they would arrive a little late.For example:Īs an alternative to using ‘say’ we can also use ‘tell’ (‘told’ in the past) in reported speech, but in this case you need to add the object pronoun. The same rule of moving the tenses one step back also applies to modal verbs. Here is an example for all the main tenses: Indirect speech: He said he had a new car.Īll the other tenses follow a similar change in indirect speech.For example, in the following sentence the present simple becomes the past simple in indirect speech: However, when we report things in the past, we usually change the tense by moving it one step back. When we report what someone says in the present simple, as in the above sentence, we normally don’t change the tense, we simply change the subject.

Indirect speech: They say (that) they’re cold.

Direct speech: “We’re quite cold in here.”.

When we want to report what someone said without speech marks and without necessarily using exactly the same words, we can use indirect speech (also called reported speech).

The boss was angry and shouted, “Why isn’t he here? He hasn’t finished that report yet!”.

She replied, “No, I haven’t seen him since lunchtime.”.

When Mrs Diaz opened the door, I asked, “Have you seen Lee?”.

But you can also find other verbs used to indicate direct speech such as ‘ask’, ‘reply’, and ‘shout’.

The local MP said, “We plan to make this city a safer place for everyone.”Īs you can see, with direct speech it is common to use the verb ‘to say’ (‘said’ in the past).

It is very common to see direct speech used in books or in a newspaper article.

Paul came in and said, “I’m really hungry.”.

We use direct speech when we simply repeat what someone says, putting the phrase between speech marks: When we want to describe what someone said, one option is to use direct speech. Read on to find out more about these forms and improve your English storytelling skills.

In order to describe what people said there are two different types of speech – direct speech and indirect speech (or reported speech). Such occasions can include a social situation as well as in a work email or presentation. There are many occasions in which we need to describe an event or action that happened, and very often that includes repeating what someone said.