Direct and Indirect speech are two different ways in which a person can narrate the sentence of the actual speaker to a third person.
Suppose Virat says to Rohit: I will hit a century.
Now Rohit goes to Rahul and tells him:
Case 1: Virat has said, “I will hit a century.”
Or
Case 2: Virat has said that he would hit a century.
DIRECT SPEECH.: Case 1: i.e. Virat has said, “Today, I will hit a century.”, in which the original words of the speaker have been repeated is known as DIRECT SPEECH.
INDIRECT SPEECH: Case 2: Virat has said that today he will hit a century., in which the sentence of the speaker is reported by Rohit in his own words without any change in the meaning of the statement, is known as INDIRECT SPEECH. It is also known as reported speech.
Note the use of inverted commas (“….”) in both the types. In DIRECT SPEECH, inverted commas (“….”) are used while in INDIRECT SPEECH, they are not.
Difference in DIRECT and INDIRECT SPEECH
| Criteria | DIRECT SPEECH | INDIRECT SPEECH |
| Quotation Mark | Used If a sentence is stated within the quotation mark, it is direct speech. |
Not Used If a sentence is stated without quotation mark, it is indirect speech. |
| Use of Comma | A comma is used after said.
Ex: Virat has said, “I will hit a century.” |
Comma is not used. |
| Use of that | Not used | Used
Ex: Virat has said that today he would hit a century. |
| Capital letter within quotes | Here, the quoted sentence inside the quotation mark begins with capital letters.
Ex: Virat has said, “I will hit a century.” |
Here the quoted sentence begins with a lower case.
Ex: Virat has said that he would hit a century. |
| Tense | Present Tense is used | Past tense is used |
| Use of pronoun | Different form of pronoun is used. Example I becomes he in indirect. | – |
Speech and Tense Conversions ( tense conversion of only main sentence)
| Direct Speech | Indirect Speech |
| Tense: Simple Present
Ex: He said, “I go to school everyday.” |
Tense: Simple Past
Ex: He said that he went to school everyday. |
| Simple Past
He said, “I went to school everyday.” |
Past Perfect
He said that he had gone to school everyday. |
| Present Perfect
He said, “I have gone to school everyday.” |
Past Perfect
He said that he had gone to school everyday. |
| Present Continuous
He said, “I am going to school everyday.” |
Past Continuous
He said that he was going to school everyday. |
| Past Continuous
He said, “I was going to school everyday.” |
Past Perfect Continuous
He said that he had been going to school everyday. |
| Future (will)
He said, “I will go to school everyday.” |
Would + Verb
He said that he would go to School everyday. |
Speech and Tense Conversions (tense conversion in both part. Said part and main sentence)
Note in these cases there is no change of tense.
Here verb apart from said is used.
| Direct Speech | Indirect Speech |
| Simple Present (says) + Simple Present (go)
Ex: He says, “I go to school everyday.” |
Simple Present + Simple Present
Ex: He says that he goes to school everyday. |
| Present Perfect + Simple Present
He has said, “I go to school everyday.” |
Present Perfect + Simple Present
He has said that he goes to school everyday. |
| Past Continuous + Simple Past
He was saying, “I went to school everyday.” |
Past Continuous + Simple Past
He was saying that he went to school everyday. |
| Past Continuous + Past Perfect
He was saying, “He had gone to school everyday.” |
Past Continuous + Past Perfect
He was saying that he had gone to school everyday. |
| Future + Simple Present
He will say, “I go to school everyday.” |
Future + Simple Present
He will say that he goes to school everyday. |
Changing Time/Place Expressions- You may encounter time related words like tomorrow, yesterday, last week, etc, in the direct form of speech. For this you can make the necessary changes as per the table below:
| Direct | Indirect |
| Today | That day |
| Yesterday | the day before |
| The day before yesterday | two days before |
| Tomorrow | The next day |
| The day after tomorrow | two days later |
| Next week/month/year | the following week/month/year |
| Last week/month/year | the previous/week/month/year |
| Ago | Before |
| this (for time) | That |
| Here | There |
Apart from this, personal pronouns change to the third person singular or plural, except when the speaker reports his own words:
I/me/my/mine, you/your/yours = him/his/her/hers
we/us/our/ours, you/your/yours = they/their/theirs
Ex: He said: “I like your new car.” = He told her that he liked her new car.
Ex when speaker reports his own words=> I said: “I’m going to my friend’s house.” = I said that I was going to my friend’s house.
Changes of Pronouns in Reported Speech
| Rule | Part of sentence | Form | Change if any |
| Rule 1 | Pronoun in Direct Speech Part (“within”) | First person pronoun (I, me) | Changed in this case.
First person becomes third person |
| pronoun of reporting verb (he said/I said) | third person pronoun (i.e. he, she) | – | |
| Example | He said, “I don’t want to shock people”
He said that he didn’t want to shock people. |
||
| Rule 2 | Pronoun in Direct Speech Part (“within”) | First person pronoun (I, me) | No change in such case |
| pronoun of reporting verb | First person pronoun (I, me) | – | |
| Example | We said, “we buy our clothes.”
We said that we bought our clothes. |
||
| Rule 3 | Pronoun in Direct Speech Part (“within”) | Second person pronoun (i.e. you) | Is changed according to the object |
| Object of the sentence | – | – | |
| Example | He said to her, “you are beautiful.”
He said to her that she was beautiful. |
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| Rule 4 | Pronoun in Direct Speech Part (“within”) | Third person (i.e. he, she, it) | NO CHANGE |
| Example | She said, “It is raining.“
She said that it was raining. |
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First-person pronoun in the direct speech (i.e. I, we) is changed according to the pronoun of the reporting verb if the pronoun in the reporting verb is third person pronoun (i.e. he, she).
Can=Could; May=Might; Might=Might; Must= Must; Have to= Had to; Should= Should