The past perfect or the past indefinite

Question

These sentences are taken from COCA: When I was young I had wandered through  on summer days.They'd laughed at my name when I was young, and I hadn't liked it much.He had evidenced traces of it when he was young;But I once learnt we better use the past indefinite instead of the past perfect.Is that true?Could you share your views, teachers?Thank you very  much.

Clive · Accepted Answer

Hi,

These sentences are taken from COCA:

When I was young I had wandered through Dale Creek on summer days.

They'd laughed at my name when I was young, and I hadn't liked it much.

He had evidenced traces of it when he was young;

But I once learnt we better use the past indefinite instead of the past perfect.

Is that true?

Could you share your views, teachers?

Generally speaking, use Past Perfect to indicate that something happened in the past before some other action in the past or before some later point in the past.

eg Tom came home from work at 6 pm. His wife had cooked dinner. So, they sat down immediatley and ate it.

eg Tom came home from work at 6 pm. His wife cooked dinner. At 7 pm, the dinner was ready.

I see no need in your original sentences to use the Past Perfect. But if we had their full context, perhaps we could see such a need.

Best wishes, Clive

Yankee · Answer

Hi Norwolf

The use of the past perfect of often dependent on the broader context. In other words, the other sentences before and after have an effect on the decision about whether to use the past perfect or not. It is not at all unusual to find the past perfect used in a narrative.

If you want specific input about the use of the past perfect in one or more of those sentences, it would be helpful if you also provided the broader context.

norwolfBut I once learnt we better use the past indefinite instead of the past perfect.

It seems to me that this "rule" you've heard is so overly general that it is basically useless.

Norwolf · Answer

The contexts:

honeysuckle submerged there on the floor of . Yes, he said, he saw my mother sitting on the steps stirring a cake, and I was seven and licking vanilla icing. # " Oh, Teddy, I can hardly wait. When can we go there? I want Patrice to come too. What steps do we take? The steps on or the steps on ? " # " We take the steps that lead from the Czechoslovakian gardens. " # I was so happy. When I was young I had wandered through on summer days. Then one day they built a highway over it. # Each day I passed where my father and brother were buried. # A magazine called Avenues came out with an article, " Welcome Home, Suzanne Alexander. " # A student from my old high school sent me his paper on . # Each day on the drive downtown to the theater we passed deserted and ravaged neighborhoods. My city and what happened to it since World War II was

Here the past perfect shows us the repeation of the action "wander" in the past time. Right?

trying to hide by burrowing into his side, attempting to make herself as small as possible, which was ludicrous. I inspected the animal as I drove. It had the largest paws I had ever seen on a dog. " If it grows up to its feet, it'll be as big as a horse, " I said. " A happy thought, that, " Myrddin said. " I'd been wondering what to cull her. Horse would be an excellent name. " " Folks would laugh, " I objected. They'd laughed at my name when I was young, and I hadn't liked it much. " Then we'll call her Cavell. It means the same thing but the louts won't recognize it. " By the end of the day, Nithe said the puppy knew her name. It accepted Nithe from the moment she flooded it with love from her mind, but soon it would respond to any of us. Nithe attempted to teach it to recognize me as " Dog's-brother, " laughing immoderately at what

Here the past perfect shows us the repeation of the action and the speaker's anger. Isn't it?

everything he learned, to compile teachings that he would someday impart to others. The older he grew, the more his father's attitude toward him seemed to change. He dismissed his suspicions at first, certain that he was mistaken. But the feeling persisted. Finally he asked his father about it, and Kenner -- a tall, lean, quick-moving man with wide, intelligent eyes, a stammer he had worked hard to overcome, and a gift for crafting -- admitted it was true. did not have magic of his own. He had evidenced traces of it when he was young; but it had disappeared shortly after he had passed out of boyhood. It had been like that with his father and his father's father before that and every Ohmsford he knew about all the way back to Brin. But it did not appear to be that way with . 's magic just seemed to grow stronger. told him that he was afraid that his son's abilities would eventually overwhelm him, that they would develop to a point where

"Evidence" is before "admit". "when he had been young" works here too. Don't you think so?

The past perfect or the past indefinite

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