Past Perfect............

MiStA Fouzi Thu Feb 28, 2008 3:32 pm

FORM

[had + past participle]
Examples:

She had learnt Japanese before she moved to Japan.
Had he seen his uncle when he came back?
By 1970,he hadn't graduated from the niversity.
The past perfect expresses an activity that was completed before another activity or time in the past.
Examples:
She had cleaned the house before her husband came back.
By the time he was 42,he had taught for 20 years.
As soon as he had graduated from university,he got employed in a company.
They were arrested because they had demonstrated in the street.
She wishes she hadn't been divorced.
After her neighbour raped her,she suicided.

Form:
Had been +verb+ing.
The past perfect progressive emphasizes the duration of an activity that was in progress before another activity or time in the past.

Examples:

She had been learning computation theories for seven years before she invented that software..
Had his wife been accompanying him through the cheering crowds?
he had been killing ruthlessly his political oponents for years without qualm.