Reported Questions
Direct speech: Where do you live?
How can we make the reported speech here?
In fact, it's not so different from reported statements. The tense changes are the same, and we keep the question word. The very important thing though is that, once we tell the question to someone else, it isn't a question any more. So we need to change the grammar to a normal positive sentence. A bit confusing? Maybe this example will help:
Direct speech: Where do you live?
Reported speech: She asked me where I lived.
Do you see how I made it? The direct question is in the present simple tense. We make a present simple question with 'do' or 'does' so I need to take that away. Then I need to change the verb to the past simple.
Another example:
Direct speech: Where is Julie?
Reported speech: She asked me where Julie was.
The direct question is the present simple of 'be'. We make the question form of the present simple of be by inverting (changing the position of)the subject and verb. So, we need to change them back before putting the verb into the past simple.
Here are some more examples:
Direct Question | Reported Question |
|---|---|
Where is the Post Office, please? | She asked me where the Post Office was. |
What are you doing? | She asked me what I was doing. |
Who was that fantastic man? | She asked me who that fantastic man had been. |
So much for 'wh' questions. But, what if you need to report a 'yes / no' question? We don't have any question words to help us. Instead, we use 'if':
Direct speech: Do you like chocolate?
Reported speech: She asked me if I liked chocolate.
No problem? Here are a few more examples:
Direct Question | Reported Question |
Do you love me? | He asked me if I loved him. |
Have you ever been to Mexico? | She asked me if I had ever been to Mexico. |
Are you living here? | She asked me if I was living here. |