8/15/2019 A Review of Tenses

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A review of tenses

Verbs have simple tenses (ordinary past, present, and future) as well as perfect tenses, progressive tenses,and even progressive perfect tenses. Here’s a brief list of examples for the verb “to go (an irregular verb), with

both singular and plural forms.

!imple past" he went, they went 

!imple present" she goes, they go

!imple future" he will go, they will go

#ast perfect" she had gone, they had gone

#resent perfect" he has gone, they have gone

$uture perfect" she will have gone, they will have gone

#ast progressive" he was going, they were going 

#resent progressive" she is going, they are going 

$uture progressive" he will be going, they will be going 

#ast perfect progressive" she had been going, they had been going 

#resent perfect progressive" he has been going, they have been going 

$uture perfect progressive" she will have been going, they will have been going 

%bviously, those last three tenses are somewhat rare, but in the right context, they could show up on the&'.

 

Sequence of tenses

!uppose we have a sentence, a statement of fact, which has past * present * future in it. $or example,

P did X, does Y, and will do Z.

+ow, suppose that, whatever these facts are, they are important enough for someone else to announce them,or tell them, or thin them, or believe them. -n fact, we might use any of the idioms of thining and nowing orany of the verb/ 0 “that1clause idioms here.

Someone else announced that P ____ X, _____Y, and _____ Z.

his is called indirect speech. he big 2uestion is" what tenses do we use when we change from adescription of the events themselves to a spoen or thought “that1clause in the past about the events3 -n

http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-verb-tenses-the-perfect-tenses/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-verb-tenses-the-perfect-tenses/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-verbs-progressive-tense/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-verbs-progressive-tense/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idioms-of-thinking-and-knowing/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idioms-of-thinking-and-knowing/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idioms-verbs-and-that-clauses/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idioms-verbs-and-that-clauses/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-verbs-progressive-tense/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idioms-of-thinking-and-knowing/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idioms-verbs-and-that-clauses/http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-verb-tenses-the-perfect-tenses/

8/15/2019 A Review of Tenses

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other words, what’s the right tense within indirect speech3 his sub4ect is thesequence of tenses, and therules are relatively simple. 5hat we sorta do is bac everything up to a previous1time tense

a. the present tense real event becomes past" (does Y ) becomes (did Y )

b. the past tense real event becomes past perfect" (did X ) becomes (had done X )

c. the future tense real event 6 this is a tricy one. 7ou may thing future goes bac to present or to futureperfect, but neither of those are correct. 5e actually use the sub4unctive for a hypothetical future" (will do Z )becomes (would do Z ).

d. anything progressive would stay progressive, following the above rules8 for example, (was doing omega) becomes (had been doing omega)

hus, our indirect speech sentence above would be

Someone else announced that P had done X, did Y, and would do Z.

http://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-grammar-the-subjunctive-tense/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omegahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omegahttp://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-grammar-the-subjunctive-tense/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega