Reported speech / Indirect speech

What is reported speech or indirect speech?

When we tell people what another person said or thought, we often use reported speech or indirect speech. To do that, we need to change verb tenses (present, past, etc.) and pronouns (I, you, my, your, etc.) if the time and speaker are different.

• Sally: ‘I don’t have time.’ ⇒ Sally said that she didn’t have time. 
• Peter: ‘I am tired .’ ⇒ He said that he was tired. 

Omission of that

We often leave out that after reporting verbs like say, think, etc. 

• She said she was late. (=She said that she was late.)
• I thought I would get the job.  

Say or tell?

The most common verbs we use in reported speech are say and tell. We must pay attention here. We say tell somebody something and say something (to somebody).

• They said me (that) they would help me.
• They told me (that) they would help me.
• He told (that) he didn’t have a car.
• He said (that) he didn’t have a car. 

Tense changes in reported speech

When a person said something in the past, and now we tell somebody what that person said, the time is different, and for this reason, the verb tenses change. Look at a summary of these changes.

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Pronoun changes in reported speech

In reported or indirect speech, we must also pay attention to the use of pronouns. When a person tells us something, he or she uses the first person (I, me, my, we, us, our) to talk about himself or herself and the second person (you, your) to talk about us, the person listening. But when we tell someone else what that person said, we are going to use the third person (he, she, his, her, etc.) to talk about the speaker and the first person (I, me, my) to talk about ourselves, the listener.

• ‘I will help you.’ ⇒ He said that he would help me. 
• ‘That’s my pen.’ ⇒ She said that it was her pen. 
• ‘I need your help.’ ⇒ She said that she needed my help.