Question

Ann said to me,"he is very lazy".

Rewrite in reported speech.

• A. Ann told me that he is very lazy.
• B. Ann told me that he was very lazy.
• C. Ann told me that I am very lazy.
• D. Ann said to me that I was very lazy.

Answer 1

The correct option is B Ann told me that he was very lazy.

The given sentence is a statement.

In the indirect speech 'told' may be used for 'said to'.

According to the rules of narration and reporting, if the reporting verb is in the past tense, the tense of the reported verb is changed into its corresponding past form. The reporting verb in the given sentence, 'said', is in the past form. Therefore, the reported verb, 'is' will change into 'was'.

Thus, in indirect speech, the sentence must be,

Ann told me that he was very lazy.

Thus option B is the correct answer.

Options A,C,D are incorrect as they do not follow the rules of Narration and Reporting.