French grammar · Intermediate (B1)
The plus-que-parfait: had done
How to form the plus-que-parfait and use it with the passé composé and the imparfait, in reported speech and after si.
What it's for
The (pluperfect) says what had happened before another moment in the past. It takes a story one step further back: (When I arrived, the class had already started).
English sometimes uses a simple past where French needs the plus-que-parfait: (He said he bought / had bought the painting).
- J'avais raté mon bus, alors je suis arrivée en retard.I had missed my bus, so I arrived late.
- On avait réservé trois mois avant.We had booked three months before.
- Mon mari avait toujours rêvé de vivre au bord de la mer.My husband had always dreamt of living by the sea.
How to form it
Take the passé composé and put the helper verb in the imparfait: → , → . The same verbs take (verbs of movement, , , reflexive verbs), and the past participle agrees in the same way.
| Subject | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| (j') | j'étais arrivé(e) | je m'étais levé(e) | |
| tu étais arrivé(e) | tu t'étais levé(e) | ||
| / / | |||
| nous étions arrivé(e)s | nous nous étions levé(e)s | ||
| vous étiez arrivé(e)(s) | vous vous étiez levé(e)(s) | ||
| / |
Three past tenses together
In a story, each past tense has its own job. The passé composé moves the story forward, the imparfait describes the scene, and the plus-que-parfait looks back at what had happened before. (already) often goes with it.
| Tense | Job | Example |
|---|---|---|
| passé composé | events | |
| imparfait | description, background | |
| plus-que-parfait | what had happened before |
In reported speech and after si
After a verb of saying in the past, the passé composé becomes the plus-que-parfait: →
With , the plus-que-parfait imagines a different past. The result is in the conditionnel passé: (If I'd known, I would have stayed longer).
- Il a dit qu'il avait acheté le tableau sur Internet.He said he had bought the painting on the internet.
- Si on avait pris l'avion, on n'aurait pas perdu une journée.If we'd flown, we wouldn't have lost a day.