Woman

Man
It appeared to him that this was going a little far. Just a touch out of bounds, if she didnt
mind him saying so. Why the hell had he stayed in town the summer before? To do half a
dozen jobs to get the money he sent her. That was it. She knew perfectly well they couldnt
have done it otherwise. She had agreed with him at the time. And that was the only time so
help him he had ever left her to do anything by herself.
Oh, he could tell that to his great grandmother. She had her notion of what had kept him in
town. Considerably more than a notion, if he wanted to know. So, she was going to bring
all that up again, was she? Well, she could just think what she pleased. He was tired of
explaining. It may have looked funny but he had simply got hooked in, and what could he
do? It was impossible to believe that she was going to take it seriously. Yes, yes, she knew
how it was with a man: if he was left by himself a minute, some woman was certain to
kidnap him. And, naturally he couldnt hurt her feelings by refusing.
Characteristics of indirect speech
Quotative frames: No quotation marks
Conjunctions: if, that
Backshift: past, present, past perfect, past continuous,
Demonstratives : that,
Personal pronouns: she, he, they, it
Time adverbials: the summer before, the only time, at the time
Characteristics of direct speech:
Inverted questions : so, she was going to bring all that up again, was she?
Exclamations: Oh, Yes, yes,
I tend to teach reported speech when I believe my students have got some level to
understand it and when I have to teach it according to the syllabus. Honestly, this is one of
the topics difficult for me that is why I sometimes find hard to explain it to my students. I
have tried the activities such as the telephone and The television report in Yule (1998)
but it is really hard and overwhelming for students to comprehend the changes in tenses,
in case of the reported speech. I found one activity I would like to share with you in Ur, P
(2001). In my opinion it is an understandable activity I will definitely do with students in the
secondary school.
Reported speech: Reading and discussion of texts
Materials: A pile of English newspaper cutting reporting interviews.
Procedure: Give the students the cuttings (at least one each), and tell them to copy out, or
mark in fluorescent pen, instances of indirect speech. You may need to help individuals
with comprehension of more difficult texts. Each student then reads out a selection of his
her sentences, the others try to guess the speaker and circumstances. Finally, they could
convert them into direct speech.