PAST PERFECT? WHAT'S THAT?

Time to face another verb tense. This time, we are analyzing the Past Perfect.

Basically, the Past Perfect is the past of the past.

How so?

Check out this example:

She left school. [2pm]
I arrived at school. [3pm]

So, when I arrived at school, she had already left.

Therefore, we did not meet.

Once stories are usually written in the past, the Past Perfect is used to refer to the past of the book (so, the past of the past). You can observe this in the fragment below:

ROWLING, J. K.. Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban, 1st edition – Bloomsbury: 1997 - http://freeharryporterebook.blogspot.com/

All these events happened before the time of the narrative. They are Harry Potter's past, before the book started.

So, time to practice it! Try it HERE and HERE.

Cheers,
J.