This document provides examples and rules for changing direct speech into indirect speech in English grammar. It discusses the differences between direct and indirect speech, and how punctuation, tense, pronouns, place and time adverbs are changed in indirect speech. Key rules covered include: maintaining the tense of the reported verb if the reporting verb is in the present or future tense, changing the tense of the reported verb to the past tense if the reporting verb is in the past tense. Yes/no questions are changed to use "if" or "whether", while wh- questions do not require any changes. Examples are provided to illustrate applying these rules to change direct speech into the corresponding indirect speech sentences.

1. B.A. I SEM ENGLISH
GRAMMAR EXERCISES

2. DIRECT AND INDIRECT SPEECH
 Study the sentences written below:
 1. He says, “ I am unwell.”
 2. He will say, “ I am unwell.”
 3. He said, “ I am unwell.”
All the three sentences written above are the examples of
Direct Speech. In the Direct Speech , we have two
parts; reporting speech, and the reported speech. In the
above three sentences, he says, he will say,

3. CONTINUED …
 and he said are said to be REPORTING SPEECH and
the sentence I am unwell which is enclosed within
double inverted commas in all the three sentences is said
to be REPORTED SPEECH.
 The verb in the reporting speech is said to be a reporting
verb and the verb of the reported speech is known as
reported verb.

4. CONTINUED …
 When we quote speaker’s actual words, this is called
DIRECT SPEECH.
 We may report what he said without quoting his exact
words. This is called INDIRECT ( or REPORTED)
SPEECH. The first three sentences written above are the
examples of the DIRECT SPEECH. We may change
them to Indirect speech without changing their meaning
as done below:

5. CONTINUED…
 1. He says that he is unwell.
 2. He will say that he is unwell.
 3. He said that he was unwell.
The basic rule to change a sentence from Direct speech to
Indirect Speech is:
RULE : If the reporting verb is in the present tense or in
the future tense the tense of the reported verb will not
be changed.( you can see this happen in sentence no. 1
and 2 above).

6. CONTINUED…
 And if the reporting verb is in the past tense, the tense
of the reported verb is changed to its corresponding past
except in cases where reported speech talks of a
universal truth or habitual action ( for example: the
teacher said, “ The sun rises in the east.” will be changed
to The teacher said that the sun rises in the east.)

7. CONTINUED…
 Help List one
 —Words indicating nearness are changed into words showing
distance:
 Here—there,
 tomorrow—the next day/the following day,
 this—that,
 yesterday—the previous day or the day
before,
 these —those,
 the next week—the following week,
 today—that day,
 now—then,
 tonight—that night

8. CONTINUED…
 Help list two
 —The following changes in the tense need to be
considered;
 Is/am—was, can—could,will—would,
 Are —were,shall—should,may—might
 Is (sleeping)—was(sleeping)
 Are (sleeping)—were(sleeping)
 Has/have killed—had killed
 Was/were laughing— had been laughing
 Did—had done

9. SOME EXAMPLES OF THE PREVIOUS RULE
 I said, “My mother cooks
well.”
 She said, “I am reading a
novel now.”
 He said, “I killed an ant.”
 We said, “They have done
their job.”
 I said that my mother
cooked well.
 She said that she was
reading a novel then.
 He said that he had
killed an ant.
 We said that they had
done their job.
DIRECT SPEECH INDIRECT SPEECH

10. CONTINUED…
 She said, “ We were all
laughing
uncontrollably.”
 He said, “I can do it.”
 She said to me, “You
may need help.”
 He said, “She will do
this task quickly.’
 She said that they had
been all laughing
uncontrollably.
 He said that he could
do it.
 She told me that I
might need help.
 He said that she would
do that task quickly.
Direct Speech Indirect Speech

11. CONTINUED…
 He said to me, “ I have
often told you not to
play with fire.”
 “You have all done very
badly!” remarked the
teacher.
 The teacher promised,
“ If you will come
before school
tomorrow, I will explain
it.”
 He reminded me that he
had often told me not to
play with fire.
 The teacher remarked that
they had all done very
badly.
 The teacher promised that
he would explain it they
would come before
school the next day.
Direct speech Indirect Speech

12. CONTINUED…
 The Prince said, “It gives
me great pleasure to be
here this evening.”
 He said, “I shall go as
soon as it is possible.”
 He said, “ I do not wish to
see any of you; go away.”
 The prince said that it
gave him great pleasure
to be there that evening.
 He said that he would go
as soon as it was possible.
 He said that he did not
wish to see any of them
and ordered them to go
away.
Direct Speech Indirect Speech

13. QUESTIONS OR INTERROGATIVE
SENTENCES
 Interrogative sentences are of three types as indicated
below:
 1. yes /No Questions (Those questions which can be
answered in yes or no are known as yes/no questions.)
 2. Wh Questions (Those questions which begin with Wh
words such as; Who, what, when ,where etc, how is also
treated as a wh question)
 3. Tag/Tail Questions ( when a tag is added with any
statement affirmative or negative sentences, it is said to
be a tag question. For example; He is a good boy, Isn’t
he?, or He plays football, Doesn’t he? Or She does not
sing,does she? Etc) Note: The first two types of
questions are relevant in the present context.

14. CONTINUED…
 Yes/No questions need if or whether words which act as
conjunction to join reporting speech and reported speech.
Whereas Wh questions need nothing as they themselves act
as conjunction in Indirect Speech.For example:
 He said to me, “Are you a student?” ( You can answer this
question in yes or in no ,hence, this is an yes/ no question
which will be changed to indirect speech as; He asked me if
(or Whether)I was a student. Here if or whether acts as a
conjunction and not as a question word.
 He said to me, “What are you doing?” can be changed to the
Indirect speech as ; He asked me what I was doing. Note that
wh word what itself functions as a conjunction here, no extra
word has been inserted to join the two sentences.
 HhehHer

15. EXERCISES ON INTERROGATIVE SENTENCES
 “Where do you
live?”asked the
stranger.
 He said, “Will you
listen to such a man?”
 “What do you want?”
he said to her.
 He said, “ How’s your
father?”
 The stranger asked
where I lived.
 He asked them if they
would listen to such a
man.
 He asked her what she
wanted.
 He asked how her/his
father was.
Direct Speech Indirect Speech

16. CONTINUED…
 “Are you coming home
with me?” he asked.
 “which way did she
go?” asked the young
man.
 “Have you anything to
say on behalf of the
prisoner?” said the
judge finally.
 He asked if she/he was
going home with him
 The young man asked
which way she had
gone.
 The judge finally asked
if he/she had anything
to say on behalf of the
prisoner.
Direct Speech Indirect