to say to do sth as a command or advice

In a grammar book I found such sentences:

He couldn't help me, he said to ask Caroline.

I had thought one could use only told me to ask in sentences like that. Can 'to say to do sth' also be used as advice or command?

It's fine, infomally. There are several examples in The British National Corpus.

The sentence quoted is a comma splice. The two clauses should be separated by a semicolon or a full stop. Who wrote the grammar book?

'He said to ask Caroline' is fine in informal reported speech.

I agree with Rover. I missed the comma splice when I wrote "It's fine".

Rover_KE said:

The sentence quoted is a comma splice. The two clauses should be separated by a semicolon or a full stop. Who wrote the grammar book?

Click to expand...

You are right and so is the gammar book (Murphy, 3rd Edition). It was my fault. I haven't copied it properly.


Thanks for the explanation.

englishhobby said:

You are right and so is the gammar book (Murphy, 3rd Edition). It was my fault. I haven't copied it properly.


Thanks for the explanation.

Click to expand...

didn't copy