Direct and Indirect Narration with Examples

Do you know what narration in English grammar is? I am pretty sure that you have come across several grammar lessons while learning English. Narration is one of the most important lessons in English grammar.

Today we are going to learn how and where we can use narration in our day-to-day English.

What is narration meaning?

Before moving ahead, let's understand narration meaning through its etymology. A narration word is a noun form of a “narrate” verb. It was derived from the Latin word “narrare” which means to tell or relate. Therefore, narration meaning in English is to enable us to convey somebody's thoughts or words to other people.

Types of narration

Narration is generally categorized into two parts.

1 Direct speech: we use the actual speaker’s words.

2 Indirect speech: we use our way to tell a speaker’s words.

Let me make it clear for you with examples

1. He said, “I don’t like learning German. (Direct speech)

He said that he didn’t like learning German. (Indirect speech)

2. People say, “Our life is getting harder day by day.” (Direct speech)

People say that their life is getting harder day by day. (Indirect speech)

In other words, the narration is also knowns as direct and indirect speech or direct and indirect narration in English.

Types of sentences in narration

We use narration in several sentences yet for easy assistance we have categorized them into 5 different parts. These parts are mentioned below;

Sentence	Connective word
Assertive	That
Interrogative	If /whether or W.H.F
Imperative	To
Exclamatory	That
Optative	That

Difference between Direct and Indirect Speech

We can generally divide the direct speech into three parts.

1 Reporter

2 Reporting verb

3 Reported speech

The teacher – (the subject is known as the “reporter”)

Says – the verb that addresses the sentence is known as a “reporting verb”)

“__” – (words written in inverted commas known as “reported speech”)

S. No.	Direct speech	Indirect speech
1	Reported speech is always written in inverted commas "__".	We remove the inverted commas.
2	The comma (,) separates reporting verb and reported speech.	We remove commas (,) and use the connective word.
3	The first word in "__" should always be in capital letters.	We change the tense of the reported speech accordingly.

Rules to change into Indirect Speech

There are two most important chapters for narration that you must keep in mind. We mostly make changes in the reported speech only.

1 When the reporting verb is in the present or future tense, we change the subject and object only.

2 When the reporting verb is in the past tense, we change subject, object tense, and other words. If the reporting verb falls in the present or the future tense.

Read more: Past Indefinite Tense

We change only the ‘subject’ and the ‘object’ in the reported speech. First, go through this table.

Subject	Object	No change	SON
1st person	2nd person	3rd Person	123

First-person changes according to the subject

Rakesh is saying, I will not smoke.” (Direct speech)

Rakesh says that he will not to smoke. (Indirect speech)

‘I’ first person is changed according to ‘she’ the subject of the sentence.

Second-person changes according to the object

She says to me, “You talk wisely.” (Direct speech)

She tells me that I talk wisely. (Indirect speech)

Here ‘you’ the second person goes to the object (me).

Third-person doesn’t change

My parents say, “She is a doctor.” (Direct speech)

My parents say that she is a doctor. (Indirect speech)

Here ‘she’ the third person remains the same.

Person	Subjective	Possessive Adjective	Objective
First	I	My	Me
	We	Our	Us
Second	You	Your	You
Third	They	Their	Them
	She	Her	Her
	He	His	Him
	It	Its	It

If the reporting falls in the past tense.    

We change the subject, object, tense, and other words in the reported speech. Let’s learn how to change these things.

For the subject and the object, you have just learned above with the help of the given table.

Tense

Present tense	Past tense
Present indefinite	Past indefinite
Present continuous	Past continuous
Present perfect	Past perfect
Present perfect continuous	Past perfect continuous

Other words

Direct Speech	Indirect Speech
Can	Could
Will	Would
May	Might
Shall	Should
Here	There
This	That
These	Those
Today	That day
Tomorrow	The next day
Yesterday	The previous day
Last night	The previous night
Next week	The following week
Tonight	That night
Now	Then
Ago	Before
Thus	So
Hence	Thence
Hereby	Thereby
Hither	Thither
Last week	The previous week
Come	Go
Just	Then

You need to check the reporting verb whether is in the present, future or past tense. You have to apply the rule accordingly. Let’s see the narration examples with answers.

1 The teacher says, “I will not come tomorrow.” Here reporting verb is in the present tense.

The teacher says that he will not come tomorrow. Because we change only the subject and the object.

2 They said, “We will not work here anymore.” Here the reporting verb is in the past tense.

They said that they would not work there anymore. We change (the subject, tense and other words as per the table).

I hope it was useful for you.