Verbs: Writing from A to Z includes a section on verbs on pages 508-509 that describes the properties of verbs--person, number, tense, voice, and mood--as well as the difference between transitive and intransitive verbs. This section also includes verbals--verbs used as other parts of speech--and information about helping verbs and modal auxiliaries. With so many properties to be aware of, writers must pay special attention to verbs.

In terms of proofreading, there are a several concerns that you should be alert to. One concern is how the helping verbs to have and to be are used. Other concerns are time relationships in the perfect tenses and whether verbs are regular or irregular.

To have versus To be: To have is used with the past participle to form the perfect tenses.

    I have written many papers already this year. [Present perfect--used to call attention to the duration or repeated
                                                                                nature of an activity]

    The company finally replied, but only after I had written them several times. [Past perfect--used when for the
                                                                                                                        earlier of two past events]

    I will have written several papers before this year ends. [Future perfect--used when considering events from
                                                                                            the point of view of some time in the future]

To be is used with the present participle to form the progressive version of any of the six tenses. The progressive version stresses the on-going nature of activities.

    I am writing my lab report. [Present progressive]
    I have been writing my lab report for almost three weeks. [Present perfect progressive]

To be is also used with the present participle to form passive voice

    The report was written by an assistant to the company president. [Past tense--passive voice]
    The company president approved the report that had been written by his assistant. [Past perfect tense--passive voice]

Regular versus Irregular Verbs: Regular verbs form their present participle with -ing and their past participle with -ed. The above examples use the verb "write," which is an irregular verb having separate forms for the past participle and the past tense: wrote is the past tense form used for the past tense; written is the past participle used for the perfect tenses and for passive voice. To be is also a very irregular verb: am is the present participle, was is the past tense form and been is the past participle.

Note: A mistake sometimes made by ESL writers is to use to have by itself in combination with the present participle. There is no situation in which this usage is correct, so if you see "have" used to help a verb with an -ing ending without " been" in between, you have a problem!

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