Spanish Grammar Lesson: Direct vs Indirect Speech

15 min read

In this grammar lesson, take a look at the differences between Spanish direct and indirect speech and learn how to apply it when quoting and paraphrasing in Spanish.

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So, what’s the difference?Reporting Verbs“Que”–your new best friendBut wait… the questions…Questions with question wordsLet’s get a little more technical.Personal pronouns and Possessive pronouns.Time phrasesVerb tenses in indirect (reported) speech.Verb Tense ChangesImperfect, Conditional, and Past Perfect¡Madre Mía! That was a lot of information!

The difference between direct and indirect speech (also called reported speech) is pretty easy to understand.

But it’s not very easy to apply when speaking in a foreign language. It is a very important part of communicating, however, and plays a major role in most conversations.

Read on for a quick introduction and guide to direct vs indirect speech in Spanish.

So, what’s the difference?

That’s a very good question! Before we get too far ahead of ourselves with all the little technicalities, let’s make sure that we understand what we’re dealing with here.

In order to do this, take the following conversation:

Pedro: Where are you going?

José: To the store.

Pedro: Will you get milk?

José: Sure, no problem.

Now, let’s say Pedro later goes on to have a conversation with someone else, about the above-mentioned interaction. There are some options for how they could go about doing this. Let’s just say it looked something like this:

• Pedro: I asked José where he was going. He said, “to the store.” So, I asked if he would get some milk, and he said “sure, no problem.”

The above recounting of a previous event or exchange with another person is what we’re going to look at. You have two options when doing this.

The first is by using quotation marks. This is direct speech. This means that the words are being repeated exactly like they were said.

• He said, “to the store.”
• …and he said, “sure, no problem.”

The second way of recounting a conversation is through indirect speech. In the example above, this is done through changing the verb tense, although that isn’t always required (we will look at that more later).

• Original: Where are you going? Reported: I asked him where he was going.
• Original: Will you get some milk? Reported: I asked if he would get some milk.

Basically, there are 3 important rules to keep in mind when using indirect (reported) speech. They are:

• You will not use quotation marks
• Since you’re not quoting, you don’t need to say word-for-word what the person said
• When reporting what someone said, you generally change the verb tense.

Reporting Verbs

There are still a few things we need to talk about before getting into everyone’s favorite part about grammar–the technicalities.

In order to identify that something is being “reported” or to communicate that you are repeating something that someone said previously, you’ll use a reporting verb. We have them in English as well.
The most common are:

*Most common of the most common

“Que”–your new best friend

You’ll notice that (almost) all of the examples above in the chart using reported speech include the little word “que.” This is not a coincidence.

When reporting a statement with a finite verb clause, you normally introduce it with que (meaning “that”): Dijo que estaba cansada (She said she was tired). English often omits “that,” but Spanish normally keeps que in this pattern. Reported questions use si or a question word, as we’ll see below.

“She said that she was tired.”- Here, in English the “that” is optional. This is not the case in Spanish.

“He asked that I go to the store.” (He asked me to go to the store.) – this is one of the examples where the “that” wouldn’t usually be used in English, but it would in Spanish.

But wait… the questions…

If you’re reporting a question, you have a few options available as they don’t always need the “que”.

Yes and No Questions.

If the answer to the question being reported can be “yes” or “no” you don’t need the “que.” In these situations we would use the “si” like in English (if).

“He asked me if I could go to the store.”- Me preguntó si podía ir a la tienda.

Questions with question words

If you are reporting a question that contained the question words  (where, who, when, etc.) you will not need the “que” but stick with the question word used in the original context.

• María: Where is Sara? (¿Dónde está Sara?)

Reported speech: Maria wanted to know where Sara was. (María quería saber dónde estaba Sara.)

Let’s get a little more technical.

We’ll try to ease you into all of this grammatical stuff. It seems like a lot to remember. But, a lot of it is very common in English as well, so try not to get too overwhelmed!

Personal pronouns and Possessive pronouns.

Again, let’s start with an example:

• María: Can you tell my brother that I need to talk to him? ¿Puedes decirle a mi hermano que le tengo que hablar?

Here, obviously a few things need to change if you want to report this statement. For one, he’s not your brother and for another you’re not the one that needs to speak to him.

In this situation, the personal pronouns (you, I) need to change, as well as the possessive (my). Here’s how this statement would sound when repeating it later on to someone else:

• Direct speech: María asked me, “Can you tell my brother that I need to talk to him?” María me pidió: “¿Puedes (tú) decirle a mi hermano que (yo) le tengo que hablar?” The pronouns remain the same.
• Indirect/Reported speech: María asked me to tell her brother that she needed to talk to him. María me pidió que (yo) le dijera a su hermano que (ella) necesitaba hablar con él. Here, you can see that the pronouns changed.

So far so good, right? It’s pretty basic stuff up to this point. Just like in English, we need to change the subject and the pronouns.

Time phrases

Obviously, more often than not, if you’re reporting something that happened it’s because the person you’re recounting the event to wasn’t there when it took place–i.e. it was in the past.

Here’s how you can change time and place expressions when the reporting context changes. If you are still talking on the same day or in the same place, a change may not be necessary.

As you’ll notice above, all of the examples are written in the past. This is also something important to pay attention to, and probably one of the most important grammatical points of reported speech. So, let’s go ahead and dive right into that!

Verb tenses in indirect (reported) speech.

The tense the reporting verb is in (present, past, future) will have a big impact on the rest of the sentence.
Not only will you need to pay attention to the tense, but also to what is being said.

Command/Request vs information

Depending on the context of the conversation being reported, you’ll need to use different ways of repeating it.

This is where things can start to get a little tricky. We do have similar rules in English as they do in Spanish, but in English they are a little more flexible, and followed less frequently.

Here are some good rules to keep in mind when using indirect speech in Spanish:

• If the reporting verb is in the present or present perfect, the reported tense normally stays the same when reporting information. A request or command introduced by que commonly uses a subjunctive form instead.
• If the reporting verb is in the preterite, imperfect, or past perfect, you often shift the reported tense to reflect the earlier viewpoint. This is not automatic: a tense can remain unchanged when the information is still true or the original time reference is retained.

Let’s look at a quick scenario and see what we have:

Scenario: Let’s say you’re texting with someone, and your friend (who you’re with physically) wants to know what the person texting you is saying.

Person 1: What did he say?

Person 2: He wants to know if we are free tonight. (reporting information)

1: Why? What does he want?

2: He wants us to help him move. (reporting a request)

Here, we can see that in the first part, Person 2 is simply repeating the information. He asked a question, and this is what it is. The reporting verb “want to know” is in the present, so the second verb is in the present as well.

In the second part of the exchange, the reporting verb is in the present, so in English, we keep it in the present as well. In Spanish, however, if we are reporting a request or command, we need to use the subjunctive. In this case it will be the present subjunctive because the reporting verb is in present.

In Spanish the conversation would go like this:

Person 1: ¿Qué dijo?

Person 2: Quiere saber si estamos libres esta noche. (present-present)

1: ¿Por qué? ¿Qué quiere?

2: Quiere que le ayudemos a hacer la mudanza. (present-present subjunctive)

Note: Verbs such as decir, pedir, and querer can introduce a request or command with que + subjunctive. The meaning matters: que alone does not trigger the subjunctive. Compare the reported questions and requests below.

• A reported yes/no question commonly uses si + indicative: Quiere saber si podemos salir esta noche (He wants to know if we can go out tonight); Me pregunta si quiero quedar mañana (He asks me if I want to meet up tomorrow). Here, you are reporting the information sought by a question, rather than turning it into a command.
• When reporting a request or command, use que + subjunctive: Fernando dice: “Ten cuidado” (Fernando says, “Be careful”) → Me dice que tenga cuidado (He tells me to be careful). Fernando pide: “¿Me puedes ayudar con los deberes?” (Fernando asks, “Can you help me with my homework?”) → Fernando me pide que le ayude con los deberes (Fernando asks me to help him with his homework). When decir reports a statement of obligation, the indicative can remain: Fernando me dice: “Tienes que ir a clase mañana” → Fernando me dice que tengo que ir a clase mañana (Fernando tells me that I have to go to class tomorrow).

Verb Tense Changes

So, if you feel like all of that has settled into your mind and it’s not going to explode just yet, let’s keep chugging along!

With a present reporting verb, the reported tense normally stays the same when reporting information. A request or command introduced by que commonly uses the present subjunctive instead.

With a past reporting verb, a tense shift is common. The following examples show the usual shifts, rather than changes required in every context:

Present Simple–Imperfect

• Direct speech: Angela dijo, “No puedo ir.” (Angela said, “I can’t go.”)
• Indirect/ Reported speech: Angela dijo que no podía ir. (Angela said that she couldn’t go.)

Preterite–Pluscuamperfecto (past perfect)

• Direct speech: Sergio dijo: “Ayer compré un móvil nuevo”. (Sergio said, “Yesterday I bought a new cell phone.”)
• Indirect/ Reported speech: Sergio dijo que el día anterior había comprado un móvil nuevo. (Sergio said that the day before he had bought a new phone.)

Future simple (will)–Conditional simple (would)

• Direct speech: Candela dijo, “Llegaré tarde.”– (Candela said, “I’ll arrive late.”)
• Indirect/ Reported speech: Candela dijo que llegaría tarde. – (Candela said that she would arrive late.)

Imperfect, Conditional, and Past Perfect

In the following examples, the imperfect, conditional, and past perfect stay the same. Yay!

Imperfect:

• Direct speech: Juan dijo, “la playa era muy bonita.” (Juan said, “the beach was very pretty.”)
• Indirect/ Reported speech: Juan dijo que la playa era muy bonita. (Juan said that beach was very pretty.)

Conditional:

• Direct speech: María dijo: “Me gustaría vivir en Nueva York”. (María said, “I would like to live in New York.”)
• Indirect/Reported speech: María dijo que le gustaría vivir en Nueva York. (María said she would like to live in New York.)

Past Perfect

• Direct speech: Mi padre me dijo, “a las 5 ya había llegado.” (My dad told me, “at 5 I had already arrived.”)
• Indirect/ Reported speech: Mi padre me dijo que a las 5 ya había llegado. (My dad told me that at 5 he had already arrived.)

Just one more thing… I promise!

One last thing to remember, like we saw with the present tense, if the verb in the past is a reporting verb, and what is being reported is a command or request, you will use the subjunctive–past subjunctive this time!

• Direct speech: Mis padres me dijeron: “Vuelve a casa a las 23.00”. (My parents told me, “Come home at 11:00 pm.”)
• Indirect/Reported speech: Mis padres me dijeron que volviera a casa a las 23.00. (My parents told me to come home at 11:00 pm.)

¡Madre Mía! That was a lot of information!

Let’s see if we can condense it down just a little bit.

Important rules to remember. If you are using reported speech:

• You will not use quotation marks
• Since you’re not quoting, you don’t need to say word-for-word what the person said
• When reporting what someone said, you generally change the verb tense.

If you do need to change the verb tense, this is why and when:

• If the reporting verb is in the present or present perfect, the reported tense normally stays the same when reporting information. Commands or requests introduced by que with a present reporting verb commonly take the present subjunctive.
• If the reporting verb is in the preterite, imperfect, or past perfect, a tense shift is common when the time perspective changes. Commands or requests introduced by que with a past reporting verb commonly take the imperfect subjunctive.

If the reporting verb is in the past and the time perspective shifts, these are common tense changes:

• Present simple–imperfect
• Preterite-Past Perfect (Pluscuamperfecto)
• Will future–simple conditional (would)

Verb tenses that normally stay the same in these examples:

• Imperfect
• Conditional
• Past Perfect

Things to keep in mind:

• Remember your reporting verbs
• Remember to change the personal and possessive pronouns
• Remember your time phrases

Conclusion

In reality, it’s not as complicated as it looks. It may take a little practice to get used to, but after a while, you’ll find that is relatively similar to what we do in English.