PAST

PERFECT
STRUCTURE
 I/We/You/They/He/She/It + had + past
participle

I had gone home before you arrived.

She had gone home before you arrived.
Questions and negations
I had eaten dinner before my family got home.

Had you eaten dinner before your family got home?

Yes, I had.
No, I hadn’t eaten anything before my family got
home.
USE
 When we talk about things that happened before
the starting point of the story in the past.
Sarah arrived at the party.
When Sarah arrived at the party, Paul had already
gone home. So Sarah didn’t meet him there.
 With because, giving a reason for a past event or
action.

Karen didn’t want to go to the cinema with us

because she’d already seen the film.
 With never…before

 Theman sitting next to you on a plane was very

nervous. It was his first flight.
He’d never flown before.
 For a past event completed before a definite time
in the past.

Angela had finished cooking by 11:30 a.m.

 With the first/second…, the best time….

That was the first time I had been to Paris.

It was the worst time I had ever had.
PAST PERFECT
CONTINUOUS
 To emphasise the duration of an action in progress
up to a moment in the past or before another past
event.

He had been teaching for 35 years when he retired.

By 2009, he had been working in New York for 5
years.
 For an action whose duration caused visible results
later on in the past.

When they came back from the beach, their skin was
red. They’d been lying in the sun for 3 hours.