Herb,
   Thanks much for passing this on. It is, as Dick noted, a pleasure to
read a thoughtful view. Several times over the last few months I have
felt sadness that the issue of past perfect couldn't be vetted in our
usual ways without so much static coming in. It's an important issue
and there are interesting side issues that link with it.
   One point I hesitate to make because of potential static is that
grammatical redundancy is a natural part of all languages. Here's
Langacher's view of it, but one we could probably find from any serious
grammarian: "Redundancy is not to be disparaged, for in one way or
another every language makes extensive use of it. By providing the
listener with extra clues, it helps ensure that a partially degraded
message can still be understood. It allows the speaker to either
emphasize a certain notion through repetition or to portray it from
multiple perspectives" (Cognitive Grammar 2008, p. 188).
   Even in a simple sentence like "Sally often expresses her opinion", we
have reundant features. It's probably clear to all of us that Sally is
singular and female, that the opinions she often expresses are "hers"
(the default expectation) and not someone else's. But we are so used to
those features that they seem natural to us. In fact, the non-redundant
version ("Sally often express opinion") seems unnatural.
   Any explanation of the past perfect (or pluperfect) would need to
account for those instances when other features (time-orienting
conjunctions or our own sense of the nature of the underlying
processes, such as the fact that you don't usually tell about something
before it happens) make the past perfect a somewhat redundant feature.
Though it's hard to call one feature redundant when other features
could be easily charged. Redundancy, as Langacher says, is not to be
disparaged. The different "clues" are working together toward a
cohesive purpose. The fact that meaning might be clear without all of
them wouldn't make any of them wrong.
   Jesperson could never have anticipated the kind of objections recently
raised on list to very normal past perfect uses. But I think his
observations cover it very well.

Craig

I sent Brad as an attachment a copy of Jespersen's Chapter 6 of his third
> Syntax volume of A Modern English Grammar on Historical Principles.  He
> excerpted it pretty minimally below, and I thought the full text might be
> interesting to some on the list as a nuanced treatment of the pluperfect.
> The text follows.  This is scanned OCR text that I have edited to correct
> OCR errors and formatted to be close to the original.
>
> Herb
>
>
> The Pluperfect
>
>
>
> 6.1. The pluperfect (Lat. plusquamperfectum) is the tense-phrase formed by
> help of the preterit of the
>
> auxiliary had (more rarely was, cf. ch. III) and the second participle.
> The Joint Committee recommends the term Past Perfect, which I cannot use
> in this book, as I use the word "past" exclusively for the time relation
> and not for a grammatical tense.
>
>
>
> The pluperfect primarily serves to denote before-past time or a
> retrospective past-two things which stand in the same relation to each
> other as the preterit and the perfect, but which cannot easily be kept
> apart. "His wife left him (last year)", and "his wife has left him" both
> become "his wife had left. him" when projected into the past.
>
>
>
> 6.2. The relation between two successive incidents in the past, X and Y,
> e. g. my seeing him (X) and his
>
> seeing me (Y), may be graphically represented thus
>
>
>
> ----------X----------Y-----------(now).
>
>
>
> Linguistically they may be expressed by means of two preterits:
>
>
>
> I saw him (first), and then he saw me-or, combined,
>
> I saw him before he saw me.
>
> But if we use the pluperfect:
>
> I had seen him before he saw me.
>
> I saw him before he had seen me.
>
> He saw me after I had seen him.
>
> He did not see me till I had seen him--the two incidents are grammatically
> connected by means of the tenses.
>
>
>
> 6.3. The pluperfect is used both in main sentences and in subordinate
> clauses; the conjunctions chiefly used are when, after, before, till.  A
> few examples of this tense from Stevenson's T may here suffice:
>
> 5 Nor would he allow anyone to leave the inn till he had drunk himself
> sleepy l 7 At first I had supposed "the dead man's chest" to be that
> identical big box of his . . . and the thought had been mingled in my
> nightmares with that of the one-legged seafaring man. But, by this time we
> had all long ceased to pay any particular notice to the song l 84 before I
> had heard a dozen words, I would not have shown myself for all the world.
>
>
>
> 6.4. In clauses beginning with after, we have already seen that the simple
> preterit often means the same thing as the pluperfect (5.6); I shall here
> give a few examples of the latter tense, which must be considered the
> normal tense:  Ch T 4.1170 so after that he longe hadde hir compleyned , .
> . He gan tho teris wypen of ful dreye l More U 28 After that we had once
> or twise mette . . . they for a certayne space tooke their leaue of vs I
> Di P  327 Now, said Wardle, after a substantial lunch . . . had been done
> ample justice to l ib 341 within ten minutes after he had received the
> assurance that the thing was impossible, he was conducted into the outer
> office | Bennett Cd 204 And after they had chatted a little . . . he
> offered to display Machin House to Mr. Myson.
>
>
>
> On clauses with since see 5.8(3).
>
>
>
> After when the simple preterit can sometimes be used, though the two
> events mentioned follow one after the other, and the preterit is thus
> equivalent to a pluperfect:  When he came back from India, he was made a
> member of Parliament I When he got the letter, he burned it without
> looking at it.
>
>
>
> But this is not always possible; the pluperfect is required in: When he
> had read the letter, he burned it I When he had finished writing that
> book, he took a long rest.
>
>
>
> We may say either: "As soon as he discovered them, he ran away", and "As
> soon as he had discovered them, he ran away".
>
>
>
> In the following two quotations, the use of the pluperfect in the
> when-clauses, where the simple preterit would have been normal, seems to
> have been induced by the pluperfect in the main sentence: Hardy R 374 when
> his mind had been weaker his heart had led him to speak out I Rose
> Macaulay P 8 When they had been little they had watched each other's
> plates with hostile eyes.
>
>
>
> 6.5. We may have two successive pluperfects as in Thompson H Spencer 34 as
> two and a half years had
>
> elapsed since he had made any money, Spencer returned to London.
>
>
>
> (This, transposed into the present time, would be:  two and a half years
> have elapsed since he made any money).
>
>
>
> 6.6. Note the use for past time in Stevenson T 152 "I had soon told my
> story" = I told my story, and that
>
> did not take long: the speaker anticipates the time when the incident he
> is relating is already finished. Similarly in Rose Macaulay P 133 A little
> later, when she had revived, we had had tea together, and I had put a few
> questions to her I Maugham Painted V. 240 she left the room. In a moment
> Sister St. Joseph came in. She was come to say good-bye. [Or this is
> probably represented speech: she said she was come] I James RH 18 In the
> evening, as he was smoking his cigar on the verandah, a light quick step
> pressed the gravel of the garden·path, and in a moment a young man, rising
> before them, had
>
> made his bow to Cecilia. Cf. 3.3(7).
>
>
>
> 6.7. The pluperfect had hoped does not always refer to the before-past
> time, but often is temporally the same as the preterit hoped, only it
> implies that the (past) hope was not fulfilled; "We had hoped he would
> recover" (but he did not). If we say "We hoped he would recover" we leave
> the question open whether he recovered or not.  Cf. the use of the perfect
> infinitive after hoped and thought, below 10.7.
>
>
>
> Sh Ado V. 4.114 I had well hop'd thou wouldst haue denied Beatrice [but in
> the same sense Hml V. 1.267 I hop'd thou should'st haue bin my Hamlets
> wife: I thought thy bride-bed to haue deckt (sweet maid) And not t'haue
> strew'd thy graue] ] Collins W 72 I had hoped that all painful subjects of
> conversation were exhausted between us | id M 331 I had hoped to hear that
> things were all smooth and pleasant again.
>
>
>
> This had hoped may be followed by the perfect infinitive (cf. 10.7): Lamb
> R 37 I had hoped to have seen
>
> you at our house | Collins M 182 I had hoped to have recompensed your
> services, and to have parted with you without Miss Verinder's name having
> been openly mentioned between us [ Swinb Ii 108 I had hoped to have seen
> you and Clara pull together.
>
>
>
> Cp. the pluperfect in speaking indefinitely of the past: I hadn't expected
> that.
>
> Cf. the use of could have hoped instead of the impossible had could hope
> (si j'avais pu espérer) in Di D 170 If I could have hoped that Steerforth
> was there, I would have lurked about until he came out alone.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Brad Johnston
> Sent: 2009-04-11 15:09
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Exhibit #104, Jespersen's Modern English Grammar
>
> This is for everyone's eyes except Herb. He's in the penalty box, pending
> his release of his definition.
>
> A Modern English Grammar on Historical Principles, c.1932.
>                by Otto Jespersen (1860 - 1943)
>
> Part IV, Syntax, Third Volume, pp. 81-84.
>
> 6.4 The pluperfect is used both in main sentences and in subordinate
> clauses; the conjunctions chiefly used are: when, after, before, till. A
> few examples of this tense from Stevenson's T may here suffice:
>
> ~ examples
>
> After when, the simple preterit can sometimes be used, though the two
> events mentioned follow one after the other, and the preterit is thus
> equivalent to a pluperfect.
>
> ~ examples
>
> In the following quotation, the use of the pluperfect in the when-clause,
> where the simple preterit would have been normal, seems to have been
> induced by the pluperfect in the main sentence.
>
> When they had been little they had watched each other's plates with
> hostile eyes.
>
> (Shades of Huddleston's, "When Arthur had been a boy he had used to play
> football". One might wonder who copied from whom. Get the knuckle-rapper.)
>
> This is Exhibit #104 to my assertion that there is at least one past
> perfect error on any grammar website or in any grammar textbook you can
> name. Challenges are welcome, encouraged, and appreciated.
>
> .brad.11apr09.
>
>
>
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