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Anonymous Posted 12 years ago
Grammar
Sold/have sold/ had sold
I read this sentence in another forum:This is what we sold by 5 p.m.
The online teacher revised it in this way:This is what we had sold by 5 p.m.
In my opinion , "sold" is not suitable here because of the time marker " by", but "have sold" is better than "had sold" since the former indicates a description of an past event from now while the latter implies a description of an past event from a time point between 5 pm and now .
Am I right ? Thanks!
The online teacher revised it in this way:This is what we had sold by 5 p.m.
In my opinion , "sold" is not suitable here because of the time marker " by", but "have sold" is better than "had sold" since the former indicates a description of an past event from now while the latter implies a description of an past event from a time point between 5 pm and now .
Am I right ? Thanks!
Top answer
Any of them is possible. It depends on when 'now' is. More context is required.
- Any of them is possible.
- It depends on when 'now' is.
- More context is required.
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4 Answers
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Any of them is possible. It depends on when 'now' is. More context is required.
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yzh1978 past present tenseWhat does that mean?
In any case, I cannot see that 'by + time' is relevant to any particular verb form:
I sold 1000 cars by 1965.
I will sell this next car by 10:00 today.
I have sold 3 cars by noon every day this week so far.
I will have sold 18 cars by Saturday.
etc.
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