Past Perfect Simple
The past perfect simple is what we can call a key point of grammar - especially for German learners of English.
Why is that?
Because German gets in the way... And Germans tend to use a past perfect form where a past simple would be 'good enough', that is, correct ;-)
Why is that?
Because German gets in the way... And Germans tend to use a past perfect form where a past simple would be 'good enough', that is, correct ;-)
Stanley's Quick Tip :The more complex forms of English grammar are there
to express more complex things. They do this together with a second sentence in a different tense.* Das soll heißen: Eine Zeitform wie das Past Perfect steht eigentlich nie allein - sondern bildet mit einem anderen Satz (und einer anderen Zeitform) erst die 'ganze Geschichte'...
'Simple forms' (past simple, present simple) dagegen stehen oft alleine - bzw können das. Mistake:' Yesterday I had cooked a perfect dinner.'
??? When what happened ??? Correct: 'Yesterday I cooked a perfect dinner.' |
How do we form a past perfect ?
When I had finished the report, I went for lunch.
As soon as Sam had seen me, he began to laugh.
I hadn't noticed my mistake, because I was in such a hurry.
I like to say, the past perfect simple is the "paster past" (tongue in cheek - scherzhaft). But that's a nice 'picture'...
Die vergangenere Vergangenheit.
In the examples you can see this: two actions - both in the past, and one even older / further in the past than the other.
You decide which is the older action and which is closer to the present .
Imagine a clothes line:
::: Past Perfect Simple Practice :::
* Nicht vergessen! Stanley's Tipps sind einfache und manchmal vereinfachende Regeln, die helfen, schnelle Entscheidungen während des Sprechens fällen zu können - Quick Tips eben. Sie erheben keinen Anspruch auf 100% Richtigkeit - ABER sie sind so gut, das man damit sehr weit kommt und mehr Fehler vermeidet, als man macht :-)