He died before his dream came/had come true.

[Mike12345]

1 He died before his dream came true.

2 He died before his dream had come true.

Which sentence is correct? I am not sure if sentence 2 is ok. I think sentence 1 is wrong. Because his dream has neve come ture. If we use "came", It means his dream has already come ture. What do you think?

 

[Tarheel]

Re: Tense

His dream never did come true, did it? So they are both wrong.

 

[Raymott]

Re: Tense

In my opinion, sentence 1 is good.
His dream was that the Tigers beat the Panthers in the AFL. That happened the year after he died. His dream did come true, but he didn't live long enough to see it.

 

[Phaedrus]

Re: Tense

I think (2) is fine even if his dream never came true. To me, only (1) has the incorrect implication that his dream came true sometime after he died. (Note that there is nothing wrong with that implication in and of itself. It's only because of the stipulated context that it's an unwanted implication.) The past perfect in "before"-clauses has been observed by linguists to be special. Somewhere in Quirk et al. (A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, 1985) there is a sentence like "I saw them before they had seen me," which may be used in a context in which "they" never saw the speaker. Let me know if you'd like me to find and quote the passage. Here are a few alternatives you might consider using instead of (2):

He died without his dream having come true.
He died without having fulfilled his dream.
He died with his dream unfulfilled.

 

[Mike12345]

Re: Tense

His dream never did come true, did it? So they are both wrong.

So how can I say that in one sentence？

 

[Tarheel]

Re: Tense

Perhaps:

He died before his dream could be realized.

Or:

What he had dreamed of happening -- hoped would happen -- finally came to pass after he died.

Is that what you mean?

 

[Matthew Wai]

Re: Tense

His dream had not come true when he died.
He died, and his dream never came true.

 

[Raymott]

Re: Tense

So how can I say that in one sentence？

You could consider what I said in post #3, that is "He died before his dream came true."

 

[Rover_KE]

Re: Tense

Mike, please note that I have changed your thread title.


'Thread titles should include all or part of the word/phrase being discussed.'