Select the option that expresses the given sentence in Direct to Indirect Speech.
She said, "Can I ask a question?"
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: A
Explanation
When changing the sentence She said, "Can I ask a question?" into indirect speech, several grammatical transformations occur:
Reporting Verb: Because the original sentence is an interrogative (a question), the reporting verb "said" is changed to "asked".
Conjunction: For "yes/no" questions (those starting with auxiliary verbs like can, do, or is), the conjunction "whether" or "if" is used to connect the reporting clause to the reported speech.
Tense Shift: The modal verb "can" shifts to its past tense form, "could", to match the past tense of the reporting verb ("asked").
Pronoun Change: The first-person pronoun "I" changes to the third-person "she" to maintain the perspective of the speaker.
Sentence Structure: The question format is converted into a declarative statement, so the subject ("she") now comes before the verb ("could").
Indirect speech: She asked whether she could ask a question.