34.4 Future perfect
(a) Expresses a completed action envisaged at a point in the future, often with an
element of determination or desirability:
Vor meinem vierzigten Jahr werde ich mein eigenes Haus gebaut
haben. (See 103 .)
Before I am forty I will have built my own house.
(b) Can also express supposition (89.1):
Er wird in die Kneipe gegangen sein.
He’ll have gone to the pub (I suppose).34.5 Simple past
See also 34.7 (p. 73).
(a) Describes completed actions:
Sie spielten Tennis und dann fuhren sie in die Stadt.
They played tennis and then went into town.
(b) Describes incomplete or continuing actions and states in the past:
Er schrieb (gerade) den Brief, als ich anrief. (See 76.4c.)
He was (just) writing the letter when I phoned.
(c) Describes actions and states which precede a focal point in the past:
Ich lernte ihn 1994 kennen. Er wohnte (schon) seit zwei Jahren in
Berlin.
I got to know him in 1994. He had been living for two years in
Berlin.
(d) Expresses habitual actions in the past:
Jeden Samstag machten wir eine Wanderung.
Every Saturday we went/used to go/would go for a walk.34.6 Perfect
See also 34.7 (p. 73).
(a) Conveys individual or isolated actions in the past:
Sie sind nach München geflogen.
They flew/have flown to Munich.
(b) Often implies that the action in the past has some continuing relevance to the
present situation:
Das haben wir erst gestern erfahren.
We only just found that out yesterday.
Die Wiedervereinigung hat schwere Folgen für die deutsche
Wirtschaft gehabt.
Reunification has had serious consequences for the German economy.
(c) Can have future reference, referring to an event which will have been completed
before another one begins:34
VERBS