Direct & Indirect Speech.
In direct speech we repeat the speaker’sexact words. The words repeated are put between inverted commas.
e.g.: He says, “I’ll never get married”.
In indirect speech we report the speaker’sspeech without using his exact words without changing the exact meaning.
e.g.: He says that he will never getmarried.
Remember when the reporting verb is inpresent or present perfect tense with a modal auxiliary, we report directspeech without any change.
The changes are listed below: using theverb “wait”
Direct Speech IndirectSpeech
Wait (SimplePresent) waited(simplepast)
Is/am/are waiting(PresentContinuous) was/werewaiting(PastContinuous)
Has/have waited (Present Perfect) had waited (PastPerfect)
Has/have been waiting (Present PerfectContinuous) had been waiting (PastPerfect Conti)
Waited (Simple Past) hadwaited (Past Perfect)
Shall/will wait wouldwait
Words indicating nearness in time andplace will change into words indicating distance. The changes are:
Direct Speech IndirectSpeech
This/these that/those
Here there
Now then
Today/tonight thatday/ that night
Last week theprevious week
Tomorrow thenext day
Next week thefollowing week
Yesterday theday before
Ago before.