Question

Bob said: "Don't disturb me, please". Bob asked me didn't disturb him. Bob said to me I disturbed him. When we repeat another person’s words, we can use reported speech. When we report another person’s words some time after (s)he said them, we usually use a past tense verb to introduce them, and we change the tense of the verbs as well. We usually change pronouns and time and place words in reported speech: e.g. ‘me’ changes to ‘him’ or ‘her’.We can report positive or negative advice, requests, orders and instructions. In the test sentence we see a negative request. We usually report requests with ‘ask’ or strong requests with ‘beg’. We report negative instructions, requests, advice or orders with verb + not + infinitive with ‘to’. So, we put ‘not’BEFORE the infinitive with ‘to’. Therefore, in the test we need to choose answer 3.

Accepted Answer

Bob said to me don't disturb him. Bob asked me not to disturb him. c

Question	Bob said: "Don't disturb me, please".
A	Bob said to me don't disturb him.
B	Bob asked me didn't disturb him.
C	Bob asked me not to disturb him.
D	Bob said to me I disturbed him.
Answer	c
Remark	When we repeat another person’s words, we can use reported speech. When we report another person’s words some time after (s)he said them, we usually use a past tense verb to introduce them, and we change the tense of the verbs as well. We usually change pronouns and time and place words in reported speech: e.g. ‘me’ changes to ‘him’ or ‘her’.We can report positive or negative advice, requests, orders and instructions. In the test sentence we see a negative request. We usually report requests with ‘ask’ or strong requests with ‘beg’. We report negative instructions, requests, advice or orders with verb + not + infinitive with ‘to’. So, we put ‘not’BEFORE the infinitive with ‘to’. Therefore, in the test we need to choose answer 3.

Bob Disturb Report Negative Asked Person’s Reported Words