REPORTED SPEECH
REPORTED SPEECH When we report someone’s words we can do it in two ways. We can use direct speech with quotation marks ( “I work in a bank” ), or we can use reported speech ( He said he worked in a bank .) In reported speech the tenses, word-order and pronouns may be different from those in the original sentence. Present simple and present continuous tenses Direct speech: “I travel a lot in my job” Reported speech: He said that he travelled a lot in his job. The present simple tense ( I travel ) usually changes to the past simple ( he travelled ) in reported speech. Direct speech: “Be quiet. The baby’s sleeping.” Reported speech: She told me to be quiet because the baby was sleeping. The present continuous usually changes to the past continuous. NB: “I work in Italy” Reported speech: He told me that he works in Italy. It isn’t always necessary to change the tense. If something is stil...