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Message board > CAN YOU HELP ME WITH THIS ONE?
CAN YOU HELP ME WITH THIS ONE?
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pilarmham
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CAN YOU HELP ME WITH THIS ONE?
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It �s a rephrasing question in which the word after must be used:
We had dinner and then we watched the film
The correct answer is supposed to be:
We watched the film after we had had dinner
Could we say ... after we had dinner?
Most of my students gave that answer and I don �t see why it isn �t correct...
Thank you.
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4 Dec 2012
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SVieira
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What about "We watched the film after having had dinner"? Would that work? The usage of the past perfect suggested in the correct answer is probably meant to make it clear that having dinner occurred before the film was watched. |
4 Dec 2012
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pilarmham
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Thanks for answering, SVieira, but I guess my question is: is it incorrect to say after we had dinner? |
4 Dec 2012
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perma
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"After we had dinner" is correct. After all it �s two actions that happened one after the other.
There are cases when both simple past and past perfect are possible in a sentence. There �s a rule that explains it, the gist as I remember is that when you �re talking about a single, specific action that took place not long before the more recent one, plus when there is a time expression (here "after") which explicitly shows what happened first, you can use both the simple past and past perfect tense. Eg I talked to Mary after her husband had left. I talked to Mary after her husband left. Both fine.
Actually the simple past sounds better in your sentence as you avoid the double "had".
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4 Dec 2012
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abba
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I gues it is because the action of having dinner comes first and then you watch TV. Then, the first action is in the past perfect and the second action is in the past simple. Hope it helps. :)) |
4 Dec 2012
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anaram
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I agree with Perma "after we had dinner is perfectly OK.
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4 Dec 2012
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yanogator
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Yes, perma has a good explanation. Although the "official rule" is that we need the past perfect for the action that was first, very few (if any) native speakers would say "had had" in this case. Bruce |
4 Dec 2012
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Matthew S
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You can say it two ways:- "We had dinner" is fine as a simple narrative explanation of something that happened, like going to a football match - i.e. "simple past" But if you want to use more of a "completed" meaning, as in "we had had dinner", and then something happened, you �d probably say "we �d had dinner" and that IMHO would be the natural English way to say it....so both are right, but they have slightly different emphasis/meaning.... I dunno about all the rules, �cos I don �t teach grammer if I can help it, but there is a difference, and that �s it I think...? |
5 Dec 2012
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