if reported speech

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• English Grammar
• Clause structure and verb patterns

Reporting verbs with 'that', 'wh-' and 'if' clauses

Level: intermediate

Reporting verbs with that clauses

When we want to report what people say or think, we can use a reporting verb and a clause with that :

He said  that I had to see a doctor . I thought  that he was being silly .

We can leave out the word  that :

He said  I had to see a doctor . I thought  he was being silly .

These verbs have the pattern:

Noun + Verb + ( that ) + Clause

With some verbs, we can mention the hearer as the object of the verb:

She reminded him that it was time to go . He told me he was a friend of yours .

Noun + Verb + Noun + (that) + Clause

Reporting verbs with wh-  and if clauses

Some reporting verbs introduce a wh-  clause or an if clause:

She explained what we had to do . I didn't know where to go . He asked if I was ready . I wonder if they're at home .

Noun + Verb + wh-  word + Clause

Noun + Verb + if + Clause

He told me what I had to do . He asked them if they were ready .

Noun + Verb + Noun + wh-  word + Clause

Noun + Verb + Noun + if + Clause

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Can I call the if-clause an object in the sentence: Call this number and find out if you were selected.

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Hello bre.ribeiro,

Yes, you can. The verb in question here is 'find out' and 'if you were needed' is its object.

You can test this a couple of ways. One way it to see if you can create a passive construction. If you can, you can be sure that you have an object. Here, you can: ...and if you were selected can be found out .

Another way is to see if you can replace the item with a noun or a pronoun. Again, here you can: ...and find out this information / ...and find it out .

The LearnEnglish Team

Hi teachers, I want to ask about the task number 9 "I was wondering if you'd like to go for a drink with me", why don't we use "I was wondered if.."? my second question, is this sentence correct "he wonder if you want to go on a date with him"?

Hello rachl,

'wonder' is a verb and 'I was wondering' is the past continuous form of it. We sometimes use the past continuous to talk about the present in a polite way (see the Polite expressions section on our Past tense page; this is why a past continuous form is used here.

Although adding '-ed' to the end of a bare infinitive can sometimes create an adjective (for example, 'interest' + '-ed' > 'interested'), this doesn't work for all verbs. 'wonder' is one of the verbs that it doesn't work for.

As for your second question, yes, that is correct except for one small error: the verb 'wonder' needs to have 's' at the end since its subject is 'he': 'He wonder s if you want to go on a date with him'.

All the best, Kirk LearnEnglish team

Hi teacher, I'm little bit confused about the above example of Wh- clause (I didn't know where to go). Is 'where to go' a wh- clause or something else? As we know, clause has always a subject and verb.

Hi Khoshal,

Clauses can be finite (with a subject and a verb marked for time) or non-finite (using a non-finite verb form such as an infinitive or a participle). Non-finite verbs generally do not have subjects in the clause. You can read more about finite and non-finite clause structure here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-finite_clause#Structure

Thank you Peter for the reply. In this example 'I didn't know where to go', does it mean the subordinate clause (non-finite clause) has the same subject as the subject of the main clause? Are the following sentences equal in meaning? I didn't know where to go = I didn't know where I had to go

Hello again Khoshal,

Yes, that's right. The subject is the same and so is the time reference, so if a past tense verb is used in the first clause then the non-finite clause also has a past time meaning.

Hello Nevi,

'be added' is a subjunctive form -- more specifically a passive form in the subjunctive. In this case, the subjunctive is used to express a desire for something to be different than it actually is.

I'd refer you to the Wikipedia page on the English subjunctive  to learn a bit more about this. It's a bit technical in places, but if you focus on the examples, I think it will help you make sense of it.

All the best,

Hi Nevı,

Could you give us some example sentences with the structures you mean? That will make it easier to discuss :)

Hello Nevı,

'I forgot I lend you money' is not correct because the action of lending is an action that doesn't extend throughout time -- you lend someone something and then the action of lending is done. The item is still lent or borrowed, but the action itself is considered over in the way English sees it.

'I forgot you spoke Spanish' is correct, but so is 'I forgot you speak Spanish', and they both mean the same thing (unless the person no longer speaks Spanish). Since the ability to speak a language is more of a state than an action that begins and ends quickly (like 'lend'), then we can use the present tense to refer to that ability. But we can also use the past tense to refer to that past situation more than the person's current ability, which is why 'spoke' is also correct.

Hope this helps you make sense of it.

Yes, it sounds to me as if you understand this correctly. We generally backshift the tenses (as you describe), though sometimes we don't when speaking of something that is still true or generally true. But you can also use a backshifted tense (e.g. past simple) when speaking of something that is still true or generally true and you're mostly concerned with the past situation rather than the general truth or current state.

In this case, 'spend' refers to the passing of time, so it is an action that extends through time, i.e. through those five days.

Does that help you make sense of it?

That doesn't sound right to me unless the immigrant is talking about something they do regularly. For example, if he/she spends Monday through Friday on a boat every week, then that would work. But he/she is talking about their trip to their new country, which was one trip in the past, then 'spent' would be the correct form.

Is this perhaps a news headline? The lack of 'an' or 'the' before 'immigrant' isn't correct in most other situations. If this sentence isn't from a headline, perhaps it's from a source that just isn't grammatically correct.

Hello Ahmed Imam,

The first version is correct. The reason is that the sentence is not a question, so there is no need for an interrogative structure (inversion).

Both forms are grammatically possible here, so neither is better or worse - it depends what you want to say. Had believed tells us that the speaker no longer believes in magic; believed does not tell us about his or her current views.

Both forms are correct. Most of the time we'd use the first one, but if you wanted to put some emphasis on her age just before she started working, you could use the second one.

I think both are possible. However, without context the sentence is ambiguous: it's not clear if the admitting was the night before (and the mistake earlier) or the mistake was the night before (and the admitting in the present in narratve terms0.

Though I don't know the context, I would imagine that the answer is 'someone else'. After all, if you are speaking to Tom then you don't need to ask if he is at home, so the question would make no sense.

Hi Ahmed Imam,

Yes, I agree :) I think all the options work. Two of them ( had to / would have to ) are the backshifted verb forms that are normally used in reported speech. But the other two options ( must / will have to ) are also correct, because the reported speech sentence includes tomorrow .

I don't find any major difference in meaning between the four options, only that the forms with  have/had to leave are more likely to mean an externally imposed obligation (i.e. somebody or something is forcing him to leave), while he must leave could be an external or an internal obligation (i.e. leaving is his own personal choice; he wasn't forced to do it).

Does that make sense?

Both of these are used, but I'd recommend the 'had gone' form.

I'd recommend the first sentence for most situations. The fourth one's also correct, though I think it'd be more natural to switch the order of the clauses: 'Tom told me that he'd burnt himself while he was cooking.'

Hello Kim Hui-jeong,

Generally, we do not need to backshift the verb in reported speech when the facts described have not changed between the time of the original speech and the time when it is reported. It is not wrong to shift the tense back, but it is not necessary. However, if the facts have changed then shifting the tense back is used to indicate this. For example:

"I love you."

> She said she loves me. [she loved me then and she still that loves me now]

> She said she loved me. [she loved me then; it is not clear from the sentence if she still loves me now]

In your example, the fact cannot have changed, so both options are possible.

Hello kiwikiss0319,

The verb demand follows this pattern:

demand (that) sb do sth

In this pattern, do is the bare form of the verb. It is actually the present subjunctive form:

She demands that he go now. The police are demanding that she give them the passcode to her phone.

In your example demand is a noun but the construction remains the same.

If the action is in the past then the past subjunctive is used:

She demanded that he went immediately. The police were demanding that she gave them the passcode to her phone.

Other verbs which follow this pattern include insist, suggest, recommend and propose. As you can see, many verbs like this have a similar meaning.

You can read more about the subjunctive in English here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_subjunctive

Hello Ahmed Imam

'if' and 'whether' are both correct here.

All the best

Both forms are possible. In reported speech (including reported questions) there is often a tense shift backwards, which would make ' Will you watch... ' into ' ...if I would watch... '. However, the shift is not always necessary. If the event (the match) has not yet taken place then  will  is also possible. There is no difference in meaning in this case.

The first sentence is correct, but the second one is not. If you changed 'has just told' to 'just told', then it would be correct, especially in American English, where it's very common to use the past simple with 'just' to refer to a very recent past.

Please note that you might hear a sentence like the second one in informal speaking from time to time, but it is not a standard form.

Without any other context, the first sentence is the one I would choose. While the second sentence is not grammatically incorrect, it does not seem very natural to me.

Hello Risa warysha

'makes' is what we say here. 'what' can include the idea of plural things too, but we just use a singular verb after it in this case.

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