Reported Speech

Statements, commands and requests

Reported statements - intro
Look at these examples:

The little prince: “I want a sheep that

will live for a long time.”
 The little prince said (that) he wanted a
sheep that would live for a long time.
 The author: “This is my airplane.”
 The author said that was his airplane.
The differences
The changes you see are due to the fact
we don’t quote speaker’s words but
report them.
The first difference you can see is the
omission of inverted comas.
The second one is the use of introductory
verbs such as say, tell etc.
They are normally used in the past tense.
NB ‘Tell’ requires the object whereas ‘say’
doesn’t.
• The use of ‘that’ is optional.
Further changes
Personal pronouns and possessive
adjectives change, e.g. I he/she,
you I/we, my his/her, your my
etc.
The little prince: “I want a sheep that
will live for a long time.”
 The little prince said (that) he wanted a
sheep that would live for a long time.
 The author: “This is my airplane.”
 The author said that was his airplane.
Tense change
o Since the introductory verbs are
normally in the past tense, the tense in
the main part changes, too. Thus:

o Present Simple Past Simple

o The little prince: “Everything is so small

where I live.”
o The little prince said that everything was
so small where he lived.
Tense change
Present Continuous Past Continuous

The little prince: “I am telling you this

partly because of the snake.”
The little prince said he was telling him
that partly because of the snake.
Tense change
Present Perfect Past Perfect

“I’ve been silly,” she whispered at last.

She whispered at last that she had been
silly.
Tense change
Past Simple Past Perfect

“You are like the fox when I first

encountered him,” he told the roses.
He told the roses they were like the fox
when he had first encountered him.
Tense change
Future Simple Future in the Past

The fox said: “You will then understand

that your rose is unique.”
The fox told the little prince he would
then understand that his rose was unique.
Tense change
Must had to; can could

“You must keep your promise,” said the

little prince.
The little prince told him he had to keep
his promise.
The little prince said: “I cannot
carry this body with me.”
The little prince said he could not
carry that body with him.
Other changes
 Adverbs of time: now then,
yesterday the day before,
tomorrow the next day,
today that day, ago before
 Adverbs of place: here there etc.

“I do not have to live here,” said the

little prince.
The little prince said he did not have to
live there.
Reported commands & requests
Look at these examples:

“Draw me a sheep”, the little prince said.

The little prince told him to draw him a
sheep.
“Please draw me a sheep,” the little
prince said softly.
The little prince asked him to draw him a
sheep.
 NB Use ‘tell’ with commands and ‘ask’ with requests
Changes
As you can see from the previous
examples, there is no tense change when
reporting commands and requests – the
verb changes into the infinitive.
Examples
When reporting negative commands you
must remember that ‘not’ comes before
‘to’.
The rose said: “Don’t hang about so.”
The rose said to the little prince not to
hang about so.
“Do not come tonight” the little prince
said.
The little prince told him not to come
that night.
More examples
“Come back tomorrow evening” the little
prince told him.
The little prince told him to come back
the next evening.
The rose whispered: “Please forgive me.
Try to be happy.”
The rose asked the little prince to
forgive her and to try to be
happy.
Thanks for attention

All used examples in direct speech taken from the book

“The Little Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery,
translated by Irene Testot-Ferry