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17
I shall have returned before you get the supper ready.
I shall return at 10.
§ 14. The perfect forms belong either to the continuous or to the common aspect and as such they have
specific semantic characteristics of either one or of the other. Thus the perfect continuous forms denote
continuous actions taking place during a definite period of time preceding the present moment or some moment
of time in the past or future. The moment of time in question may be either excluded or included in
the period of time of the action, as in the following:
Don’t wake her up, she has only been sleeping for half
an hour. (She is still sleeping at the moment of
speaking.)
I’ve woken her up, she has been sleeping ever since
dinner. (She is not sleeping at the moment of
speaking.)
She had been living in St.-Petersburg for 10 years
when we met. (She was still living there at that
moment of past time.)
They had been living in St.-Petersburg for 10 years
when they moved to N. (They were not living in St.-
Petersburg any longer at that moment of past time.)
He will have been working here for 20 years next
autumn. (He will still be working here at that moment
of the future.)
He will have been working there for 5 years before he
returns to our institute. (He will not already be
working there any longer at that moment of the
future.)
The perfect forms of the common aspect are devoid of any specific aspect characteristics and acquire them
only from the lexical meaning of the verb or out of the context in which they are used. Thus terminative verbs
in the perfect forms of the common aspect express completeness of the action:
She had shut the window and was going to sleep.
The completed actions expressed by such forms may be momentary or iterative, as in:
He had stumbled and fallen down before I could
support him.
He had stumbled and fallen down on his knees several
times before he reached the bushes.
Non-terminative verbs may express both completed and incompleted actions:
She had spoken to all of them before she came to any
conclusion.(поговорила)
I have known him all my life. (знаю)
They may also express iterative or durative actions:
He had lived in many little towns before he settled in
St.-Petersburg.
She had lived here since the war.
Thus the difference between the perfect and the perfect continuous forms is similar to the difference between
the indefinite and the continuous non-perfect forms.
Before passing on to a thorough study of all verb forms in detail it should be clearly understood that every
one of them is a bearer of three grammatical categories, those of tense, perfect, and aspect, that is every form
shows whether the action refers to the present, the past, the future or the future viewed from the past; whether it
belongs to a certain moment of time within each of these time-divisions or precedes that moment, and whether
it is treated as continuous or not.
Table I
Tense, aspect and perfect forms of the English verbs
Tense
Perfect
Aspect
Non-Perfect
Perfect
Present
Common
Takes
Has taken