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Reported speech/There is-are
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Message from mrenglish2015 posted on 21-02-2015 at 21:18:10 (D | E | F)
Hello,
could you please help me with this question?
If I have a direct question with is [ are] there? what can I use as a subject?
''how many boys are there in the class ?''
can I say: how many boys there were in the class .
2. ''where is there nearest bank ''
can I say where there was the nearest bank . or where the nearest bank was .
3. ''is there any milk ''
Can I say if there was any milk .
Thanks in advance
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Edited by lucile83 on 21-02-2015 21:45
Message from mrenglish2015 posted on 21-02-2015 at 21:18:10 (D | E | F)
Hello,
could you please help me with this question?
If I have a direct question with is [ are] there? what can I use as a subject?
''how many boys are there in the class ?''
can I say: how many boys there were in the class .
2. ''where is there nearest bank ''
can I say where there was the nearest bank . or where the nearest bank was .
3. ''is there any milk ''
Can I say if there was any milk .
Thanks in advance
-------------------
Edited by lucile83 on 21-02-2015 21:45
Re: Reported speech/There is-are from traviskidd, posted on 21-02-2015 at 23:35:16 (D | E)
Hello.
Remember that with "there (be)" constructions, "there" is treated as the subject for purposes of inversion, but the verb agrees with the true subject.
There is a ... There isn't a ... Is there a ...?
There are some ... There aren't any ... Are there any ...?
This remains true even with more complex constructions:
There has to be ... There doesn't have to be ... Does there have to be ...?
Other than this, reported speech works the same as in any other case: simply replace the present with the past, the past with the pluperfect, the future with the conditional, etc.; and with questions, remove the inversion.
She asked "Where is there...?" --> She asked where there was...
So your first and third sentences are correct. However, your second one is incorrect, as superlatives require "the", which is incompatible with "there is" (at least in the sense of "there exists"; one could say "There's the president!" for example, but that type of sentence doesn't have an interrogative form).
Hope this helps. See you.
Re: Reported speech/There is-are from mrenglish2015, posted on 22-02-2015 at 09:23:27 (D | E)
Hello,
of course your reply helped me a lot.
Thanks a lot.
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Edited by lucile83 on 22-02-2015 10:17
Forum > English only
