Narrations Rules for all types of sentences

 

Narrations

 

Some common Changes While changing a direct speech to indirect

S.No	Type of sentence	Reporting verb	Inverted Commas	Change of Pronoun	Change of Tense	Change of Words for time, place or expressions
1.	Declarative	Say/ Says / Will say /said , remains same. Said to +Object  will be replaced as “told”	“that”		ü	ü           ü
2.	Interrogative	ask / asked	“if” in simple questions, nothing in Wh-questions.		ü	ü           ü
3.	Imperative	order / command / request / suggest / advise / forbid / instruct	“to”		ü	ü           ü
4.	Exclamatory	exclaimed with+ noun/ Exclaimed+ adverb. A word for given expressions to be mentioned as noun or adverb.	“that”		ü	ü           ü
5.	Optative	wish / pray / hope	“that / to” Sometimes no conjunction is used		ü	ü           ü

 

1.Change of Pronoun

a) 1^st person pronoun ( I / we ), Will be changed according to “Subject” of reporting speech.

b) 2^nd person pronoun (you) , will be changed according to “Object” of reporting speech.

c) 3^rd person pronoun (he/she/it/they) has “No Change”

i.e

1st person	2nd person	3rd person
I / We	You	He/she/it/they
Subject	Object	No Change

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2. Change of Tencse

Change of tense will take place only if reporting verb is in past tense.

Present Indefinite                                    into                                 Past indefinite

Present continuous                                  into                                 Past continuous

Present perfect                                         into                                Past perfect

Present perfect continuous                      into                                 Past perfect continuous

 

Past Indefinite                                          into                                 Past perfect

Past continuous                                        into                                 Past perfect continuous

Past perfect                                              NO CHANGE

Past perfect continuous                           NO CHANGE

 

In all future tenses, only its helping verb will be changed. i.e

Will / Shall                                                into                       Would / Should

Will be / Shall be                                      into                       Would be / Should be

Will have / Shall have                               into                       Would have / Should have

Will have been / Shall have been              into                       Would have been / Should have been

 

Modal Verb

Direct Speech	Indirect Speech
Can	Could
Could	NO CHANGE
Shall	Should
Should	NO CHANGE
May	Might
Might	NO CHANGE
Must	Had better / Had to / Would have to
Ought to	NO CHANGE
Will	Would
Would	NO CHANGE

 

3. Change of Words used for time , place , or expressions

Direct speech	Indirect speech
this	that
these	those
it	it
here	there
thus	so
now	then
just	then
ago	before
hither	thither
come	go
hence	thence
yet	till then
today	that day
tomorrow	the next day
the day after tomorrow	the day after the next day
yesterday	the last day / the day before
the day before yesterday	the day before the previous day
tonight	that night
next day	the following day
next week	the following week
last night	the night before