Those of you who are bilingual, especially in French, Spanish, or Italian, will know that there are regular verbs and irregular verbs in almost all languages. Regular verbs are conjugated a certain way that is consistent. In Spanish, the verb to speak or to live is a regular verb, but to be or to go is irregular.
English has the same system. The verb to have is complicated for some people. In the simple past tense, it's a regular verb. For example, I have, you have, he or she has, we have, and they have. To have itself remains regular when we move into the past tense. For example, I had, you had, he or she had, we had, they had. Easy peasy. But wait a minute. Where we run into problems is when we use to have as an auxiliary verb, otherwise known as a helping verb, for the past present tense. Here’s what I mean:
Sometimes the conjugation is regular, e.g., I had lived, I had seen, I had been, I had served, I had gone. No problemo, señor! On those occasions, you are simply taking the past tense of your verb and adding some form of to have, which remains a regular verb. However, that won’t work for verbs like to see or to be. You can say I lived or I had lived, I walked or I had walked. You can say I had seen, but you can’t say I seen. You can say I went, but you can’t say I had went or I gone. You can say I ate, but you can’t say I had ate; you can only say I had eaten. This is not something you can figure out with any kind of formula. Just like Spanish or Italian, you have to memorize your irregular verbs.
Most people with English as a first language figure this out easily because
they hear their parents, teachers, friends, and colleagues speaking correctly.
Still, some people don't get it. If you’re a fan of reality TV like me—hey,
come on! It’s my one guilty pleasure. I could do cocaine or pop Adderall, but
instead I watch 90 Day Fiancé and Married at First Sight as my
big guilty pleasures—I recommend watching Judge Judy for a great example
of how not to talk and how not to write! Some participants on the show make
really bizarre conjugations, particularly with the past perfect tense of to
have. This drives Judy crazy, and often she will correct them in her signature rude
fashion.
But, as I always say to my fiction writers, there is a place at the table for
bad language. No, not THAT bad language, although that pertains as well. I’m
talking about I seen or I been there. Where do you put that in your book? In
dialogue because sometimes it’s super realistic. But you have to be careful
because you don’t want to make fun of anyone or sound classist. You have to
create a character who would actually talk that way. Conversely, you don’t want
to sound pretentious with your characters; it’s not a good idea to have your
characters talking too formally without ever using contractions or never making
a grammatical mistake. I routinely advise many of my fiction writers not to use
the word whom in dialogue because it just doesn’t sound natural for their
character.
To summarize, pay careful attention to the past perfect tense of to have.
Happy writing.
Sigrid
