171. Aspects of the Past Perfect Tense

.

The “had” tense suggests much more than just “further in the past”

RATIONALE FOR THIS TOPIC

Verb tenses are not generally given much attention within this blog because the focus is on grammar topics that are less fundamental and/or are not extensively explained in mainstream publications (for the exact policy, click here). However, I wish in this post to look at the so-called “past perfect simple” tense (made with had) for the same sort of reasons that I elsewhere consider full stop usage, relative pronouns and aspects of article usage: I hope to make a complicated topic a little easier to understand than is usually the case.

There are numerous different uses of the past perfect tense. I am not aiming to cover them all, but rather to pick out some that I consider to be of especial interest to professional writers. Readers seeking information about other English tenses within these pages will find a little in the posts 48. Tricky Word Contrasts 1 (#1),  76.Tenses of Citation Verbs,  118. Problems with Conditional “If”,  147. Types of Future Meaning and 225. Simultaneous Occurrence.

.

THE FUNDAMENTAL MEANING OF THE PAST PERFECT TENSE

It is often believed incorrectly that the past perfect tense is for actions and states that are “far” or “early” in the past. The reason is perhaps the way past perfect verbs often combine with past simple ones in sentences like the following:

(a) The army approached a wide plain. The general had given the order to attack.

Here, the past perfect had given indicates that the order-giving was earlier than the event in the previous sentence. If the past simple tense gave had been used instead, the sequence of the two events would have been fixed as the reverse, the same as that of their naming (see 222. Information Orders in Texts, #1).

It is easy to conclude from such usage that the English past perfect tense merely expresses the idea of a more distant past time. However, in reality it does more. Consider the following:

(b) World War 1 had begun in 1914. It came to an end in 1918.

Here, the past perfect had begun again indicates the earlier of two events, but now replacing it with the past simple began indicates the same – and yet the meaning is still different.

The difference, which grammar books rarely seem to mention, is that the past perfect tense shows its verb’s meaning to be before the past time that the writer is focussing on. The past simple tense, by contrast, is for events within that focus. Thus, the past perfect tense had begun in (b) shows that the beginning of World War 1 is before the past event(s) that the text is about, these latter being the war itself and/or its end, as shown by the past simple verb came. If began is used instead, on the other hand, the war’s beginning would also be within the writer’s focus.

This difference of focus is also present in (a): the past perfect had given does not just show that the order-giving took place before the other event, it also says that the other event was the central past one being written about. Now consider this first sentence in a chapter about exploration:

(c) The Portuguese had explored the Eastern Atlantic.

Unlike the earlier examples, this has only one verb. However, the use of the past perfect tense implies the presence in neighbouring sentences of verbs in the past simple that are helping to describe the writer’s main topic, later events. It would be an error to use the past perfect in (c) if such other verbs were absent (see 214. Test your Command of Grammar 2, #8).

The historical nature of all the examples above indicates the frequency of the past perfect in historical writing. However, there are plenty of uses elsewhere too (see 282. Features of History Writing). 

.

THE RELATION BETWEEN THE PAST PERFECT AND PRESENT PERFECT TENSES

While the past perfect tense is formed with had, the present perfect uses has or have. These forms, along with their names, suggest a closeness that is actually not so great. The problem is that the past perfect tense is the past form of not just the present perfect, but also the past simple.

One consequence of this is that special meanings communicated by choosing the present perfect tense instead of the past simple, or vice versa, cannot always be communicated when the past perfect has to be used. Consider these:

(d) The President, who had lived abroad for many years, favoured integration.

(e) Columbus reported that he had found a new world.

If these sentences were about the present rather than the past (i.e. with present tense main verbs favours and reports), would their past perfect verbs (underlined) have to be in the past simple or present perfect tenses?

In fact, we cannot identify the right choice because the precise meaning is not clear. Has lived alongside favours in (d) would suggest that the many years ended very recently or are even continuing, while lived would place them firmly in the more distant past. Has found alongside reports in (e) would suggest that the time of the finding was not important – the achievement of finding was the main point – while found would imply a past time that was known by both speaker and listener and was being left unmentioned for that reason.

These sentences show how the special meanings of the present perfect and past simple tenses are not able to be communicated by the past perfect tense alone. Sometimes, however, these special meanings can be communicated by the addition of other words. For example, had lived in (d) would be associated with the present perfect meaning of “in the recent past” by adding recently after had, while had found in (e) would be associated with the past simple meaning of “at a fixed time” by adding during his voyage.

Note that while recently is possible with and without the past perfect tense, some words like it are not. For example, ago always needs the past simple tense. To express its meaning with a past perfect tense, you have to use an alternative like before (see 227. Time Adverbs). The time-showing use of since normally needs the present perfect tense (see 61. “Since” versus “Because”). However, with the past perfect tense (and the past simple too) its equivalent is often from, e.g. …had lived abroad from 2005 (see 258. Saying How Long Something Lasts, #2).

Sentence (e) also illustrates the very frequent use of the past perfect tense (had found) in indirect speech with a past-time “reporting” verb (reported). The past perfect tense indicates that the action or state of the verb in the indirect speech happens earlier than the time of the past reporting verb. The past perfect may be especially frequent in such sentences because it is not replaceable there by a focus-increasing past simple tense as in (b). The past simple in indirect statements does not indicate focus – it just shows the same past time as that of the reporting verb.

.

USAGE AFTER VARIOUS SUBORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS

A subordinating conjunction needs at least two verbs in its sentence. It and its partner verb may go before or after the other verb (see 25. Conjunction Positioning). The other verb is always the “main” one in the sentence.

Outside indirect speech, the past perfect tense particularly accompanies subordinating conjunctions of time, cause and condition.

1. With Time and Cause Conjunctions

Time conjunctions are especially common in historical and process descriptions (see 210. Process Descriptions, #3). After, when, as soon as, once, until and before are noteworthy.

After introduces an occurrence before that of the main verb. If the main verb is in a past tense, the after verb can practically always be in the past perfect tense, regardless of sentence position:

(f) Ebola cases diminished AFTER victims had been quarantined.

Quite often the past simple tense is also possible (were quarantined above). It would suggest that the main verb’s event happened immediately afterwards, rather than leaving the exact length of wait uncertain.

When, as soon as and once can be used like after. However, when can also mean “while”, ruling out the past perfect (see 225. Simultaneous Occurrence, #2). Until and its partner verb indicate the end of the main verb’s state or repeated action. Often this end is a target or purpose:

(g) Interest rates needed to be high until inflation fell/had fallen.

The past simple tense (fell here) seems more suitable after until when the start of its action or state ends the other verb’s action/state, or when an instantaneous action is being expressed. The past perfect, on the other hand, is more suitable when the end of its action or state brings about the other end. Since different people might disagree about whether or not an event is instantaneous, choosing one tense rather than the other is often a way of imposing one’s own subjective view on the reader.

Before introduces the later of two events – the opposite of after. Rather illogically, it is this event’s verb that can be past perfect. The likelihood of the past perfect is greater in some cases than others. It is perhaps smallest in sentences like this:

(h) Before telescopes were invented, many believed the sun was fixed.

This means first many believed…, and afterwards telescopes were invented. The event after before is historically real. The past perfect becomes more likely before events of uncertain past occurrence, e.g.:

(i) Alexander fell ill before he (had) reached his destination.

Here, we cannot be sure whether Alexander ever reached his destination. The past simple tense is still possible after before, but the past perfect perhaps suggests non-occurrence more strongly. The greatest indication of non-occurrence would probably be with could reach (see 271. Tricky Grammar Contrasts 3, #7).

Cause conjunctions like as, because and since act in the same way as after. This is hardly surprising because like it they introduce the first of two sequential events or situations; the only difference is the suggested causal link between them. Thus, (f) above is just as possible (albeit with altered meaning) containing because instead of after.

.

2. With “if”

Two different uses of the past perfect tense are possible with this conjunction. Compare:

(j) If it had rained, the wall glistened.

(k) If it had rained, the crop would have survived.

In (j), had rained expresses a “real” past event – a cause of a subsequent one that, in the past simple tense, is the focus of attention. If is similar to when, merely suggesting less inevitability (see 118. Problems with Conditional “if”).

In (k), by contrast, had rained has a more familiar “unreal” meaning: a past event that actually did not happen. This is clear from the other verb’s inclusion of would have.

170. Logical Errors in Written English

.

.

There are some common kinds of illogical statements that writers make through faulty thinking

THE NATURE OF LOGICAL ERRORS

Logical errors are irrational messages resulting from faulty thinking. A common kind is contradictions – separate messages in a single text that each say the opposite of the other. Faulty thinking must be involved for an irrational message to be a logical error. Some irrational messages do not involve it and are not logical errors. They may, for example, be deliberately composed in order to illustrate illogicality, like this example from the Guinlist post 100. What is a Grammar Error?

(a) I went to the movies tomorrow.

Other irrational messages might be a result of faulty language rather than faulty thinking – in other words they might be linguistic errors rather than logical ones. Separating logical errors from linguistic ones is not easy. A visible error of grammar or vocabulary in an irrational message might indicate a linguistic cause of the irrationality, but even if no error is visible, language can still be the culprit – correct-looking but not the right choice, rather than just incorrect-looking (for examples of grammar errors like this, see 24. Good and Bad Repetition,  100. What is a Grammar Error? and 165. Confusions of Similar Structures 2, #5).

Logical errors are surprisingly common in serious writing, regardless of whether or not the writer is using their mother tongue. Happily, they do not normally indicate an inability to think logically: writing makes so many demands that keeping track of the logic of what you are saying can often be difficult (see 222. Information Orders in Texts).

This post aims to assist the avoidance of logical errors by analysing a limited number of typical examples that I have encountered in academic texts composed by writers whose mother tongue is not English. I regret that I am unable to provide a comprehensive survey of the problem, as I lack sufficient data for that.

.

TYPES OF LOGICAL ERRORS

1. Inaccurately Naming Category Members

Naming the members of a category is a common need in professional writing, and can be done in numerous different ways (see 162. Writing about Classifications). Inaccurate naming is quite a common error. Consider these real-life examples:

(b) *… taking measures such as a National Health Service.

(c) *… media images exemplified by three articles in the … newspaper.

(d) *The local level contains numerous advantages like a historically viable entity.

The underlined words here are the category names, and the words immediately after them are attempts to name some of their members as examples. This intention is clear from the words such as, exemplified by and like (see 1. Simple Example-Giving). The logical error in each case is the same: the names of the category members do not match the category they are being linked with.

In (b), the category word measures refers to actions to solve or prevent a problem, but National Health Service is an organization, not an action. The error is similar to that of putting an action verb like take place with a non-action subject like area (see 132. Tricky Word Contrasts 4, #1). The problem here can be corrected by identifying the action implied by National Health Service and expressing it with an -ing verb: something like instituting or supporting.

Similarly, in (c) newspaper articles do not belong to the category of media images – they are examples just of media. I think what the writer intended to say was that images within three particular newspaper articles exemplify media images. To say this without saying images twice, you could just add those within after exemplified by.

The problem with (d) – apart from the incorrect use of contains instead of has with advantage (see 277. Advantages & Disadvantages, #6) – is that a historically viable entity is not an advantageous something that the local level can “have”, but is rather one that it can “be”. This meaning can be shown by adding being after like: …advantages like being a historically viable entity.

Slightly more complex is the following:

(e) *No writers apart from the early missionaries and a few articles…

Here, the use of apart from marks the early missionaries as an exceptional subgroup of the general category writers (see 215. Naming Exceptions). The problem is that and marks a few articles as the same – an illogicality because members of the class writers must always be human, something that articles – collections of printed words – are not. One way to use the word article here without creating this illogicality is by saying article authors.

.

2. Attributing Inaccurate Characteristics

In this kind of error, the words chosen indicate something about a person or thing that cannot be true. The earlier-mentioned use of area as the subject of TAKE PLACE falls into this category, as it attributes the dynamic characteristic of “occurrence” to something static. Here are some more examples:

(f) *Prices come to a halt.

(g) *… an early stage of a child’s world.

(h) * … qualified jobs.

(i) *Tourist entry visas for this country are not difficult or expensive to obtain. This procedure reflects the government’s need for more visitors and foreign currency.

(j) *Under the revised plan, the elderly, who now receive a double personal exemption, will be abolished.

The movement-describing verb of (f) needs a movement-naming subject, which the noun price is not. The problem can be overcome by placing price before a suitable other noun that does represent a kind of movement, such as rises, falls or changes. Some non-movement nouns, such as cars, do not need such a word before a movement-describing verb – perhaps because they are obvious movers – but price is not one of them.

The status of (g) as a logical rather than linguistic error may be particularly debatable. The word stage means a point in a sequence through time, implying the existence of other such points. A following of allows mention of either the sequence (e.g. stage of development), or the nature of the stage (e.g. a stage of crisis). In the first case of means “belonging to”, in the second “equivalent to” (see 160. Uses of “of”). The problem with (g) is that a child’s world is not a sequence and is not easily imagined as a stage within one. Perhaps the writer needed to say period instead of stage.

Example (h) is a straightforward confusion: the writer meant jobs for qualified people. If you put qualified with jobs rather than people, you make it describe that word instead. The phrase qualified jobs does express a possible meaning, but an unlikely one that certainly says nothing about the qualifications of the people doing them.

Example (i) is an opposite of the error type in the previous section: instead of incorrectly naming a category member, it incorrectly names the category itself. The problem word is procedure, a noun indicating something done by humans in multiple steps. It is being used to describe human activity involving just a single step – making tourist visas easy to obtain. A much more suitable category word would be policy. For more on the use of this + category noun to repeat an earlier, more specific idea, see the exercise at the end of 28. Pronoun Errors.

Example (j) links the idea of abolished with the wrong noun (the elderly), saying something totally outlandish as a result. The simplest correction is to replace will be with will have it (see “HAVE combined with another verb” in 116. Rarer Uses of HAVE).

For another example of inaccurate characteristic attribution, see 303. Confusions of Similar Structures 4, #7.

.

3. Not Comparing Like with Like

This is a well-known kind of illogicality that many writing manuals pick up on. An example is:

(k) *Unemployment in the North is higher than the South.

This is trying to compare two kinds of unemployment – Northern and Southern. Instead, however, it compares (Northern) unemployment with the South, a region. One way to make it logical is by adding in or that in before the South (that being a pronoun repeating unemployment: see 63. Constraints on Using “the one[s]”). Alternatively, the sentence could begin Unemployment is higher in… or The North has higher… . These options make the comparison between two regions rather than two types of unemployment.

.

4. Leaving out “other(s)”

Illogicality can often be removed by adding the word other. Where in the following sentence should it be placed?

(l) *The Times was positive, and many newspapers welcomed this measure too.

Other is needed, of course, after many. Without it, The Times, a quite famous British newspaper, is implied not to be a newspaper at all. The need for other is likely to arise when one member of a group (like The Times) is being mentioned separately from one or some others (many other newspapers). For another example, see 312. Grammar Command Test 3, #a.

Care is needed, however, not to add other(s) unnecessarily, like this:

(m) All of the writers, except two others, are hostile.

Here others implies that the exceptions are not the writers – contradicting except, which says they are (see 215. Naming Exceptions). Others should be dropped.