The following sentence has been divided into parts. One of them may contain an error. Select the part that contains the error from the given options. If you don’t find any error, mark ‘No error’ as your answer.
Mr. Arun had / written the letter / before the manager arrived.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: D
Explanation
The correct answer is option 2 i.e. written the letter
Error Concept: Incorrect use of verb form in past perfect tense.
What is wrong: The verb phrase “written the letter” is used after “had”, which is correct in form, but the overall tense sequence in the sentence is not appropriate for the meaning.
Grammar Concept: When two actions happened in the past, the action that happened first should be in Past Perfect Tense (had + V3), and the action that happened later should be in Simple Past Tense.
Incorrectness of the concept in context: Actually, there is no grammatical error in this sentence.
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“Had written” shows the earlier action (writing the letter),
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“arrived” is the later action in Simple Past.
So, the sentence follows the correct sequence of tenses.
Final sentence: Mr. Arun had written the letter before the manager arrived.
Hence, the chosen option is correct.