Reported speech is used very often and probably hardly
ever thought about it. However, there are rules in English
as well as in Spanish. If somebody wants to repeat something that
somebody else has said, you can do it in written form:
Clinton said, "I
did not have sex with this woman."
Nevertheless, when reporting in spoken language the use of quotation
marks is not that easy. Certainly can be said something
like: he said - and I quote - I did not have sex with
this woman. Iin the end usually people would use
the system of reported speech.
Clinton said that he
had not had sex with this woman.
(Clinton said that he
did not have sex with this woman.)
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