Reported speech in interrogative sentences
Interrogative sentences are in two types, that is,
1 Question word beginning interrogative sentences
Pattern– QW. + Aux + S + V + O ?
Eg: When did he give you the book ?
2 Auxiliary beginning interrogative sentences or ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ questions
Pattern – Aux + S + V + O ?
Eg: Do you know Grammar ?
Here, when we report interrogative sentences, we have to change the reporting verb as ‘ask/asks’ or ‘ asked’ or ‘will/shall ask’ according to the tense form of the reporting statement.
( reporting object should be written after that)
That is, if the ‘reporting verb’ is ‘simple present’, ‘ask /asks’ should be written after the subject
If the ‘reporting verb’ is ‘simple past’, ‘asked’ should be written after the subject
If the ‘reporting verb’ is ‘simple future’, ‘will/shall ask’ should be written after the subject of the reporting statement.
After writing as mentioned above, we have to change the interrogative sentence into statement form and then report it by applying all the required changes.
But, there is a slight difference between reporting ‘question word’ beginning and ‘auxiliary beginning’ interrogative sentences.
Question word beginning interrogative sentences are reported by changing the rest of the sentence into statement form ( S + V + O ) after writing the question word , as shown below.
Martin said, “ How has he arrived here?” ( present perfect tense)
As explained above, first of all, we have to change the reporting verb ‘said’ into ‘asked’, as the reporting verb is in simple past form.
Then after writing the question word ‘ How’, we have to change the rest of the sentence “ has he arrived here’’ into statement form as “he has arrived here” and then report it as ‘he had arrived there’.
So we get the answer as,
Martin asked how he had arrived there.
Here, as the reporting verb is simple past, ‘ asked’ is written and also the ‘present perfect’ form of the verb in the direct speech is changed into ‘past perfect’ in the reported speech.
Another example,
Thomas says, “ How do we get rain ?”
( here the reporting verb ‘says’ and also the ‘direct speech’ are in simple present form)
Thomas asks how they get rain.
(Here, as the reporting verb ‘says’ is ‘simple present’, ‘asks’ is written as reporting verb and also the reported speech is written in simple present form.)
The difference in reporting ‘auxiliary beginning interrogative sentences’ is
To add ‘whether’ or ‘if’ before the sentence and, change the whole sentence into statement form. After doing so, the sentence can be reported.
Eg: John said, “ Will Peter come tomorrow?”
( Reporting verb ‘said’ is simple past and the Auxiliary beginning interrogative sentence is in simple future)
John asked ‘whether’ Peter would come the next day.
Here ‘asked’ is written, as the reporting verb ‘said’ is simple past.
Then ‘whether’ is added before changing the whole sentence into statement form.
Then the direct speech in auxiliary beginning sentence is reported by changing the modal ‘will’ into ‘would’
and the word ‘tomorrow’ into ‘the next day’ , as we have studied in the earlier topics, Changes in tenses, modals and be-forms and Change of words in Reported speech.
Another example,
Mary says to Mathew, “Have you seen operas ?”
( Reporting verb ‘says’ is ‘simple present’ and the direct speech is in present perfect form)
Mary asks mathew if he has seen operas.
Here, the reporting verb ‘says’ is changed into ‘asks’ and then the direct speech is reported by adding ‘if’ before the sentence and changing the whole sentence into statement form.
But there is no change in the tense , as the reporting verb is in simple present form.