Learn English Grammar: DIRECT & INDIRECT SPEECH (REPORTED SPEECH)

193,335 views ・ 2023-09-05

Learn English with Gill


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Hello. I'm Gill at engVid, and today we have a lesson on direct and indirect speech. So,
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what do I mean by that? So, this is whenever you're either talking about or you're writing
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about what somebody said, and there are two different ways of doing it. So, you might
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be just having a conversation with a friend, and you're telling them about a previous time
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with a person who was speaking and what they said. Or you could be writing something, and
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you need to write down what somebody said, and there are two different ways of doing
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it. So, they're called direct speech and indirect or reported speech, whether you're speaking
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about it or writing it down. But here, I'm showing you... Obviously, I've written some
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examples down, so this is written, but these could just as easily be spoken face-to-face
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with another person. Okay. So, the first example here is the direct speech. "He said", quotation
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mark, "I'm going to the office", full stop, quotation mark. So, this is direct speech
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because you're quoting exactly the words the person said. Okay? So, if you remember exactly
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what the person said, you can quote them. Sometimes people aren't quite sure, but they
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might say, "Oh, he said something like", and then put something in quotation marks, sort
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of approximately what they said, but usually between the quotation marks. Also, if you're
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writing an essay and you're quoting from another source with quotation marks, you can't change
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anything; you have to quote exactly what it is. So, it is... In quotation marks, it should
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really be exactly what the person said. But, of course, if you can't remember what they
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said or if you prefer to say it in a more indirect way or reporting more loosely what
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the person said, you would say, "He said that he was going to the office." Or you don't
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have to use "that", that's why it's in brackets. "He said he was going to the office." You
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don't have to use that little word, "that". It's a bit more formal to use "that". So,
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you can see the difference here is that there are no quotation marks, because we're not
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quoting directly. It's just a sort of an approximation of what the person said. But you can also
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see that there's a difference in the tense, because at the time he said this, he was speaking
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in the present tense. He said, "I'm going", "I am going", at now, at this moment, "I am
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going to the office." So, he may have been answering a question if the person said, "Oh,
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hello, John. Where are you going?" "I'm going to the office." So, he may have been answering
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a question, but in that moment he's speaking in the present tense, so obviously you quote
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in the present tense. But in the indirect reported speech, you're talking about something
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that's happened in the past when you saw him. So, "He said he was going to the office."
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We've gone into the past tense here, because it was in the past by the time you're talking
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about it. Okay. And then we'll find this all the way through the different examples, the
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tense has to change to go further back into the past. Right, so here's another example,
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then. So, "The director said", quote, "The meeting will begin at 2pm", unquote. So, when
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people say this out loud, quote, unquote, that's quite a useful thing to know. Quote,
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unquote, beginning of quotation, end of quotation. Right. So, here, the director is speaking
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in the future. "The meeting will begin at 2pm." So, maybe the director is speaking at
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12 o'clock, lunchtime. You know, have your lunch, take your time. "The meeting will begin
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at 2pm." Okay, so future tense. So, how does that change if you then move to indirect reported
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speech? So, "The director said that the meeting would begin at 2pm." So, we've gone from "will",
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future, to "would" in the past. Much later now, later, probably after the meeting has
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taken place. Okay. And again, we've got that, but it's optional. "The director said the
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meeting would begin at 2pm." It may be that everyone's sitting around the table waiting
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and it's 10 past 2. "The director said the meeting would begin at 2pm." Well, why hasn't
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it started yet? Where is the director to start this meeting? So, that's possible as well.
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That's the kind of context you could have for that. Okay. But there's the change from
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"will" to "would" there. Okay.
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And then another nice, simple one going from present to past. "She said, quote, 'I live
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in London.'" Unquote. But then if you're reporting this later indirectly, "She said she lived
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in London." She said that she lived in London. That's what she said. Even if she still lives
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in London now while you're speaking, the following day or the following week, she still lives
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in London as far as you know, but it goes into the past tense because she said it in
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the past. So, "She said she lived in London." Okay. So, from "live", present, to "lived",
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past. Right.
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And then a slightly different one. We've got the present perfect here, and then it changes
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to the past perfect. So, whatever tense you're in for the quotation, you have to go further
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back in the past for the indirect reported version. So, "The artist said, quote, 'I've
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- I have finished the painting.'" And then in the indirect version, "The artist said
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he had finished the painting." So, we've gone from "have finished" to "had finished". Okay.
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And then finally, another verb, modal verb, "He said, quote, 'I can't swim.'" So, if you've
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invited somebody to go swimming in the local swimming pool, and they say, "Oh, I'm sorry.
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I can't swim. I would better go and do something else, go for coffee or something instead.
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I can't swim." So, then in reported speech, indirect speech, "He said he couldn't swim."
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"Can't" and "couldn't". So, "couldn't", "could not" is the past form of "can". "Can", "could",
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"can't", "couldn't". Okay.
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So, the... So, this can be used either in speaking or in writing. So, it sounds the
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same in speaking. Of course, the difference in writing is that you have to use all the
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punctuation and the quotation marks, so it's good to know, you know, best to put a comma
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after "said". Or you could have other verbs, like "He answered" or "He mentioned", different
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verbs, but "said" is the usual one. And so it's important to know how to write it, the
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actual quotation marks. But in speaking as well, you would use the same change in the
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verbs going further back into the past when you're using the indirect speech.
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So, just to clarify, then, all the tense changes that will happen depending on what tense you're
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using in the direct speech version, which tense you will use in the indirect version.
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So, we have on the board here all the different tenses and how they will change from direct
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to indirect. So, from present simple, it will go to past simple, and so if you were saying
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in the direct form, "He said", quote, "I'm busy", in the indirect version, you would
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say, "He said he was busy." So, "I am busy", present simple; "He was busy", past simple.
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Okay? From "am" to "was" for the verb "to be". Okay?
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So, similarly for every tense, I'll just read through them. From the present continuous,
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you would change to the past continuous. From present perfect to past perfect. From present
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perfect continuous to past perfect continuous. From past simple to past perfect. From past
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continuous to past perfect continuous. Past perfect, there's no change, so if someone
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says, "I had seen that", "I had seen that", "Yes, I had seen that", in the indirect speech,
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you'd say, "He said that", "He had seen that", so it stays the same. Okay?
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And then past perfect continuous, again, there's no change. So, if someone says... She said,
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quotes, "I had been cooking that day", when there was a knock at the door, "I had been
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cooking", and that's direct speech. And then in the indirect speech, "She said that she
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had been cooking that day", so it stays the same. Okay.
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So, then as we saw on the previous board, "will" changes to "would"; "can" changes to
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"could"; "must" changes to "had to", because you can't have "must" in the past form. You
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can have "have to" and then "had to", but if you use "must", you then have to use "had
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to" in the indirect form. Okay.
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And then "may" changes to "might", and then all of these, "might" or "to", "could", "should",
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and "would", there's no change. So, for example, with "might", "She said", quotes, "I might
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be going on holiday next week." Okay? "I might be going on holiday next week." And then in
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the indirect, "She said that she might be going on holiday next week", or the following
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week, if you're talking about it sometime later. So, that is an example of how all of
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these stay the same, except you change it from "I" to "she" or "he". "I might be going
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on holiday" is the direct one. "She said she might be going on holiday", or "He said he
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might be going on holiday". So, the personal pronoun changes, but not the verb.
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Okay, so I hope that's been a helpful explanation for you on the difference between direct and
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indirect speech, how you write it with quotation marks for direct, how you have to change the
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verb tense quite often with most of these, but some of them don't change. So, if you'd
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like to test your knowledge on this, there's a quiz. If you'd like to go to the website,
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www.engvid.com, and try the quiz, see how you do. So, thanks for watching, and hope
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to see you again soon. Bye for now.
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