indirect discourse
- noun
- /ˈɪndɪrɛkt dɪsˈkɔrs/
:
discurso indirecto
- By employing indirect discourse, she effectively summarized the main points of the discussion without verbatim quotes.
- free indirect discourse
What Lovecraft does instead of dialogue is indirect discourse.
- What Lovecraft does instead of dialogue is indirect discourse.
Examples
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The teacher explained that indirect discourse often simplifies complex dialogue into a more concise form.
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Thanks to free indirect discourse, Malraux mingles the voice of the woman with the man's.
Academic text (1998) -
Besides serving the needs of the dominant, the indirect discourse allows for a more efficient presentation of the content of the text itself.
Academic text (1992) -
In order to stress the obsessive and monologic nature of the characters' thoughts, the novel has the characters engage in free indirect discourse.
Academic text (2009) -
The narrator does not provide external moral commentary, and the novel's use of free indirect discourse inhibits the reader's ability to draw simplified conclusions about trauma in South Africa.
Academic text (2008) -
Although direct speech is limited in the novel, Atwood utilizes free indirect discourse and a closely schematized narrative focus to equally represent the views of Tony, Roz, and Charis.
Academic text (2005) -
From Diego's impressions of what he sees, we move straight into his thoughts (rendered in free indirect discourse), revealing to us his obsession with the fact that his wife has just deserted him.
Academic text (1994) -
In the novel, the author uses indirect discourse to convey the characters' feelings without directly quoting them.
Antonyms
- Specialized
Repeating the exact words someone said or thought, usually in quote marks
How Direct
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly and compositionally derivable from 'indirect' (not direct) + 'discourse' (communication/speech): it denotes communication expressed without direct quotation. This is a regular, non-idiomatic composition that follows common cross-linguistic patterns, so a B1 learner who knows both words would likely understand the MWE.
Etymology
Indirect discourse is like telling someone what another person said in your own words instead of using their 'exact words'. In this indirect way you often change 'I' to 'he' or 'she' and change verb tenses, so indirect discourse means reporting speech without quoting it.