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The past perfect tense is a grammatical tense used in English to describe an action or state that was completed before another action or event in the past. It is often used to show the sequence of events in the past and to emphasize that one action happened before another.
The structure of the past perfect tense is as follows:
Affirmative Form:
[Subject] + [had] + [past participle of the main verb]
Negative Form:
[Subject] + [had not (hadn’t)] + [past participle of the main verb]
Interrogative Form:
[Had] + [subject] + [past participle of the main verb] + [?]
Examples:
- Affirmative: “She had already finished her homework before dinner.”
- Negative: “They hadn’t seen each other for years.”
- Interrogative: “Had you ever been to Paris before this trip?”
Important
In the past perfect tense, it is common to mention two events or actions to highlight the sequence of events in the past. However, it’s not strictly necessary to have two events explicitly mentioned in a sentence using the past perfect tense.
For example:
“I had eaten lunch.” (This sentence doesn’t mention a specific second event, but the past perfect tense implies that the action of eating lunch occurred before some other event in the past.)
Let’s do this exercise of past perfect tense active to passive voice. You will find all correct answers as you finish the exercise.
Quiz: