French · Chapter 29 · Lesson 8 · Grammar primer
Reported speech and the backshift
Direct speech quotes the words; indirect speech reports them through dire / expliquer / annoncer plus an obligatory que, and a past reporting verb slides the tense back one step: je suis fatigue becomes il a dit qu'il etait fatigue, je viendrai becomes il a dit qu'il viendrait.
The short version
Only a past reporting verb moves the tense
The backshift is triggered by the reporting verb, not by the words being reported. Il a dit qu'il était fatigué shifts because a dit is past. Il dit qu'il est fatigué does not shift at all, because il dit is present. Over-applying the rule is as wrong as forgetting it.
Il dit qu'il est fatigué.
French never drops the que
English says he said he was tired and thinks nothing of it. French keeps the conjunction every single time: il a dit qu'il était fatigué, never il a dit il était fatigué. This is not a register choice; leaving que out makes the sentence ungrammatical. Watch the elision to qu' before a vowel.
Il a dit qu'il était fatigué.
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