3.2.

THE PAST TENSE

3.2.1. THE PAST TENSE SIMPLE

Form: a) Regular verbs form their past tense simple by adding ed to the short infinitive:
to work I / you / he worked
b) Irregular verbs form their past tense in various ways: sing - sang (internal vowel change); lend
- lent (change in the last consonant); cut cut (invariable forms); go went (different roots:
suppletive forms). The past tense of such verbs is the second form listed in dictionaries or
grammars.
Uses and values:
(1) The basic use of the past tense simple is to describe actions / events completed in the past at
a definite time. Therefore, the past simple combines two features of meaning:
- an event/state that took place in the past, with a gap between its completion and the present
moment (i.e., the event has no longer any connection with the present moment)
- the speaker/writer has in mind a definite time at which the event / state took place.
The past tense expresses an action that took place at a definite past moment.
The definite past moment denoted by the verb in the past simple may be expressed explicitly or
may be implied from the context.
a) The definite past moment is expressed explicitly by time markers (adverbials of definite time):
yesterday, combinations with last (last night, last week), combinations with ago (two days ago,
three years ago, a long time ago), once, formerly, the other day; specific points in time introduced
by in, at, on (in 1980, at 5 oclock, on Monday); questions introduced by when, what time (because
we expect the answer to contain the precise date when the action took place):
I called on him yesterday.
Byron died in 1824. (the definite time is given).
He started working for his firm 3 years ago.
Tom phoned me at 6 oclock/as soon as he got home.
When did you see him? - the definite time is asked about.
The past simple is also used for actions which occupied a period of time in the past (now
terminated):
He spent his childhood in a little village.
She worked as a secretary from May through August.
b) The definite past moment is implied from the context: it is not necessary for the past simple to
be accompanied by an explicit indicator of time (a time adverbial). Actions completed at a definite
point in the past which is not given but implied or understood as past time occur in several cases:
- in the narrative style: The past tense is used to narrate situations that happened at a time before
NOW, but which is not given. In fact, the past tense simple is the narrative tense par excellence, a
tense normally used for the description and narration of past events, when there is a series of events
occurring in a sequence:
I knocked at the door, went in and sat down on the sofa.
I got up, switched off the radio and sat down again.
Ann went into the station and bought a ticket.
- the place of the action is specified/is given:
I bought this book in London (the definite time in the past is identified by the adverbial of
place
which, indirectly, states when the action took place).
I met him outside the museum.
- the past simple is used for an action whose time is not given but which occupied a period of time
now terminated or occurred in a period of time now terminated:
He lived in London for a long time. (but he is not living there now)
Did you ever hear Maria Callas sing?
- Sometimes the time becomes definite as a result of of a preceding verb in the present perfect: A
sentence or conversation often begins with the present perfect (which denotes an indefinite time)
but normally continues in the past tense. This is because the action first mentioned (by the present
perfect) has now become definite in the minds of the speakers.