Collins Cobuild English Grammar (136 page)

A gift from my mother, he added
in explanation
.

negatives in reporting clauses

7.13
    With a small number of reporting verbs, the negative is often expressed in the reporting clause rather than in the reported clause.
I don’t think Mary is at home
means the same as
I think Mary is not at home
, and
She doesn’t want to see him
means
She wants not to see him
.

I
do not think
she suspects me.
She
didn’t believe
she would ever see him again.
He
didn’t want
to go.
We
don’t intend
to put him on trial.

Here is a list of reporting verbs that are often used with a negative in this way:

believe

expect

feel

imagine

intend

plan

propose

reckon

suppose

think

want

wish

reporting speech and thought in informal spoken English

7.14
    In informal spoken English, the reporting verb
go
is sometimes used to introduce direct speech. The reporting clause with
go
always comes before the quote.

I said, ‘Well, what do you want to talk about?’ He
goes
, ‘I don’t care.’
I told her what I’d heard and she
went
, ‘Oh, my gosh.’
When I heard that I’d got the job I
went
, ‘Oh, no, what have I done?’

Note that you cannot add an adverb after
go
. For example, you cannot say,
He went angrily
, ‘
Be quiet
!’

7.15
    Another reporting structure that is used in informal spoken English is
be like
.
Be like
can represent either speech or thought. In writing,
be like
is usually followed by a comma. The quote is sometimes in quotation marks, and sometimes not.

He got a call from Oprah, and he
was like
, ‘Of course I’ll go on your show.’
He’
s like
, ‘It’s boring! I hate chess!’ And I’
m like
, ‘Please teach me!’
The minute I met him, I
was like
, he’s perfect.

As with other reporting verbs, you can use
be like
with a noun or a personal pronoun: for example, you can say
She was like
, …,
The doctor was like
, … or
Jane was like
, …, followed by the thing that she/the doctor/Jane said or thought.

Unlike other reporting verbs, you can also use
be like
after the pronoun
it
. This structure is often used to present a mixture of speech and thought, or a general situation. For example, if you say
It was like, Oh wow!
it is possible that nobody actually said or thought
Oh wow
! Rather, the sentence gives us an idea of the situation and means something like
It was amazing/surprising
.

So I get back in the bus, quarter of an hour passes and
it’s like
, Where’s Graham?
When that happened
it was like
, Oh, no, not again.

Be like
always comes before the reported clause.

Reporting someone’s actual words: direct speech

7.16
    When you want to say that a person used particular words, you use
direct speech
. You can do this even if you do not know, or do not remember, the exact words that were spoken. When you use direct speech, you report what someone said as if you were using their own words.

Direct speech consists of two clauses. One clause is the
reporting clause
, which contains the reporting verb.

‘I knew I’d seen you,’
I said
.
Yes please,
replied John
.

The other part is the
quote
, which represents what someone says or has said.

‘
Let’s go and have a look at the swimming pool
,’ she suggested.
‘
Leave me alone
,’ I snarled.

You can quote anything that someone says – statements, questions, orders, suggestions, and exclamations. In writing, you use quotation marks (also called
inverted commas
in British English) (‘ ’) or (“ ”) at the beginning and end of a quote.

‘Thank you,’ I said.
After a long silence he asked: ‘What is your name?’

Note that, in written stories, quotes are sometimes used without reporting clauses if the speakers have been established, and if you do not wish to indicate whether the quotes are questions, suggestions, exclamations, etc.

‘When do you leave?’ – ‘I should be gone now.’ – ‘Well, good-bye, Hamo.’

7.17
    Thinking is sometimes represented as speaking to oneself. You can therefore use some verbs that refer to thinking as reporting verbs in
direct speech
.

I must go and see Lynn, Marsha thought.

When you are using direct speech to say what someone thought, you usually omit the quotation marks at the beginning and end of the quote.

How much should he tell her? Not much, he decided.
Perhaps that’s no accident, he reasoned.
Why, she wondered, was the flag at half mast?

7.18
    Here is a list of reporting verbs that are often used with direct speech:

add

admit

advise

agree

announce

answer

argue

ask

assert

assure

beg

begin

boast

claim

command

comment

complain

conclude

confess

continue

decide

declare

demand

explain

grumble

inquire

insist

muse

observe

order

plead

ponder

pray

proclaim

promise

read

reason

recite

reflect

remark

reply

report

respond

say

state

suggest

tell

think

urge

vow

warn

wonder

write

A few of these verbs can or must be used with an object that refers to the hearer. See paragraphs
7.75
to
7.76
.

verbs that describe the way in which something is said

7.19
    If you want to indicate the way in which something was said, you can use a reporting verb such as
shout
,
wail
, or
scream
. Verbs like these usually occur only in written stories.

Jump!
shouted
the old woman.
Oh, poor little thing, she
wailed
.
Get out of there, I
screamed
.

Here is a list of verbs that indicate the way in which something is said:

bellow

call

chorus

cry

mumble

murmur

mutter

scream

shout

shriek

storm

thunder

wail

whisper

yell

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