Jespersen's and the CGEL's accounts of the Past Tense, the Present Perfect and the Past Perfect - a comparison

Seminar paper from the year 2000 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 2+ (B), University of Würzburg (Philosophy Institute), course: Proseminar, 2 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: In general, Jespersen, unlike the CGEL, doesn't explain the use of the following tenses as one would expect from a standard grammar (the CGEL clearly explains the meanings and the use of the three tenses in question by clarifying these aspects by means of easily comprehensible examples), but relates the Present Perfect, the Past Tense and the Past Perfect to each other and gives various quotations for each aspect he deals with. Therefore, it may sometimes be a bit confusing to comprehend every detail of Jespersen's way of argumentation.