A [ … ] என்-tns-PNG – ‘A says {…., that….}’
என் (weak verb) – the “quotative” verb, is used to indicate that the immediately foregoing sentence, phrase, or word is being quoted.
E.g. வாத்தியார் [பேனாவால் தான் எழுதுங்கள்] என்-கிற்-ஆர் – the teacher says “write with a pen”, the teacher says to write with a pen.
The verb என் is used both for direct quotation (e.g. ‘John says “I’m the greatest”! ) and indirect quotation (e.g. ‘John says that he’s the greatest’).
On the other hand, it must only be used for quotation: it’s use does not extend to senses of English ‘say’ as in ‘he says many things’. Note that because என் must immediately follow a quote as the very next word, its presence signals the end of a quote, somewhat as closing quotation marks do. In contrast, there is nothing to signal the beginning of a quote. As a consequence, alternative interpretations may arise. For example, instead of வாத்தியார் above being the subject of என், it could also be interpreted as a suffix-less genitive in relation to பேனா so that the sentence would mean ‘[he] says to write only with the teacher’s pen’. The correct interpretation is dependent on deciding at which point the speaker is beginning to quote, which often cannot be determined until the total organisation of the sentence is ascertained by considering all factors (including context).
English has the reverse tendency: Signalling the beginning and not the end. For example, the following sentence has alternative interpretations depending on where we decide the quote is supposed to end:
‘John says that he believes in God on Sundays’.
This sentence could correspond either to (a) or (b):
(a) John says “I believe in God” on Sundays
(b) John says “I believe in God on Sundays”
Signalling the end but not the beginning of multi-word structural units is a general feature of Tamil and may cause difficulty for the learner used to the opposite system.