question about tenses

Question

hello everybody.i have a question.when i want to tell about past,i hesitate because i dont clearly know which tense is suitable.for instance:i bought a book.i have bought a book.i had bought a book.i am unable to clearly see the differences between them.please clarify to me.(if i make mistakes please warn me.)thanks

Ant_222 · Accepted Answer

Well, to answer such a general question would mean to quotate the corresponding sections of a grammar book or a website...

If don't have a book, or want more sources, type "english tenses" at www.google.com.

Likeguslee · Answer

i bought a book.=> simple past. You bought a book at a definite time in the past such as yesterday you went to a book store and bought a book.

i have bought a book => present perfect. Your action of buying a book is recent. Maybe you just ran into a friend outside a bookstore today or just now, and you just told him/her about what you just did in the bookstore.

i had bought a book => past perfect. Your action of buying a book was completed in the past before another action. You use this tense when you want to describe some events in the past, and the act of buying a book happened before that event. For example, I had bought a book in AB bookstore before all the lights went out.

Anonymous · Answer

I was went to market.

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