Direct and indirect speech: General problems and problems of Japanese

Abstract

This paper is about direct and indirect quotation. According to generally received opinion, direct quotation implies faithfulness to form and content of the reported utterance while indirect speech only renders its content. This view is accepted. However, it is argued that, nonetheless, for indirect speech different degrees of faithfulness to the form of the reported utterance should be distinguished. The second part of the paper deals with peculiarities of reported speech in Japanese. The often voiced claim that there is no distinction between direct and indirect speech in Japanese is refuted. Grammatical and deictic problems of reported speech underlying this claim are discussed and some of the conditions giving rise to sentences that are ambiguous as to whether they are direct or indirect quotations are investigated.