Wanted to go vs wants to go in Genki I


In Genki 2nd edition chapter 11, the following translation is given:

> メアリーさんはチベットに **行きたい** と言っていました
>
> Mary said she **wanted** to go to Tibet

I would have thought that the translation should be that she **wants** to go
to Tibet. To say that she **wanted** to go to Tibet, I would think that the
sentence would be the following:

> メアリーさんはチベットに **行きたかった** と言っていました

Is this sentence not grammatical? What's the difference between the two? How
does one say that "she said wants to go", rather than "she said she wanted to
go"?




I'd say this is a case of ambiguity on the English side. Consider, you and I
both talked to Mary yesterday. You tell me, "Mary wants to go to Bali". I
might respond, "Oh, that's interesting, she told me she wanted to go to
Tibet."

In English, because we have two ways of reporting what someone says (direct
and indirect speech) there's ambiguity that enters in the tenses. (Japanese
doesn't have this distinction.) For English, depending on the context, both
"she said she wants to go" and "she said she wanted to go" could both mean the
same thing. (as in the scenario above). Nevertheless, without context, the
second one sounds like she may have changed her mind.

But in Japanese, if you wrote/said

> メアリーさんはチベットに行きたかったといっていました

then this sounds like, "Mary said she **had wanted** to go to Tibet." But
she's now subsequently changed her mind.

So, in Japanese, if you want to say "Mary said she wants to go to Japan", then
you would say

> メアリーさんはチベットに行きたいといっていました

Moral of the story, tense matters get very confused between English and
Japanese.




I'd say this is a case of ambiguity on the English side. Consider, you and I
both talked to Mary yesterday. You tell me, "Mary wants to go to Bali". I
might respond, "Oh, that's interesting, she told me she wanted to go to
Tibet."

In English, because we have two ways of reporting what someone says (direct
and indirect speech) there's ambiguity that enters in the tenses. (Japanese
doesn't have this distinction.) For English, depending on the context, both
"she said she wants to go" and "she said she wanted to go" could both mean the
same thing. (as in the scenario above). Nevertheless, without context, the
second one sounds like she may have changed her mind.

But in Japanese, if you wrote/said

> メアリーさんはチベットに行きたかったといっていました

then this sounds like, "Mary said she **had wanted** to go to Tibet." But
she's now subsequently changed her mind.

So, in Japanese, if you want to say "Mary said she wants to go to Japan", then
you would say

> メアリーさんはチベットに行きたいといっていました

Moral of the story, tense matters get very confused between English and
Japanese.

