Практикум по грамматике английского языка : учебное пособие

UNIT 5: QUALITY TIME
Focus on
• Television and Video
• Cinema and Films
• Theatre
• Past Perfect Simple
• Past Perfect Continuous
• Past Perfect vs Past Perfect Continuous
• Narrative Tenses
• Reported Speech
• say/tell/ask
Past perfect simple
Usage:
• to refer to something that happened before another action or state in the past
I had spoken to Mr Taylor before the conference began.
• to describe earlier events when telling a story in the past
Tom was 23. His father had died five years before, and since then Tom 
had lived alone.
• in reported speech and thoughts
We realized we had forgotten the address.
The following time expressions are used with Past Perfect Simple:
after 
After he had fixed his car, he decided to have a rest.
already When I arrived at the office, Kate had already left.
as soon as As soon as I pushed the red button, I realized that I had set off the alarm.
before* Jack had eaten Japanese food before. so he knew what to order.
by the time By the time Olga got back, Tom had gone away.
just She had just left when he phoned.
till/until 
He refused to go till he had seen all the pictures.
when When she had known me for a year, she invited me to tea.
yet 
When I got to the shop, it hadn’t closed yet.

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NOTE:
If before or after is used, Past Perfect Simple is optional.
Before the train arrived, Sally managed to push her way to the front 
of the crowd. 
We don’t normally use verbs of knowing, understanding, etc. in Past 
Perfect Simple unless there’s an expression denoting a period of time: 
When she had known me for a year, she invited me to tea.
When I knew the work of one department thoroughly, I was moved to 
the next department.