# The Past Simple instead of the Past Continuous in novels



## wolfbm1

Hello.

"Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly.
Today, however, they were not playing. Uncle Henry sat upon the doorstep and looked anxiously at the sky, which was even grayer than usual. Dorothy stood in the door with Toto in her arms, and looked at the sky too. Aunt Em was washing the dishes." Source: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum.

I wonder why the past simple was used for the verbs in red. The meaning of those verbs is that both uncle Henry and Dorothy were in the middle of the action expressed by them.


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## Elisa Pessoa

The verbs in red are used in the past simple tense because the sentences are somehow related to completed actions. The past continuous, in my opinion, is also possible, since the verbs "_to sit, to look, etc_." are mixed verbs, that is, they can be progressive or non-progressive verbs. However, if the writer wanted to be very specific (and he actually did), he needed to use the simple past. Check the difference:
- _*She was looking at the sky.*_ (= Stare at)
- *She looked at the sky. *(She looked at the sky firstly, and then she looked at something else.)
Still, it's better to wait for a native's perspective!


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## wolfbm1

The sentences, starting with "Today", are setting the scene for the coming cyclone. I think they could all be written in the past continuous. I don't understand why the author switched to the past simple and ended with the past continuous anyway. The story continues: 
<< From the far north they heard a low wail of the wind, and Uncle Henry and Dorothy could see where the long grass bowed in waves before the coming storm. ... Suddenly Uncle Henry stood up. "There's a cyclone coming, Em," he called to his wife.>>

So, I guess we could describe a  setting* like this:
The sun was shining and the birds were singing.  Tom and Emily rode through the forest. ... (Instead of Tom and Emily were riding through the forest.)

*I took the idea from Grammarway 3, page 19,  by  Jenny Dooley and Virginia Evans.


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## Elisa Pessoa

wolfbm1 said:


> So, I guess we could describe a setting* like this:
> The sun was shining and the birds were singing. Tom and Emily rode through the forest.  (*I'd say the tenses are perfectly used in these sentences.)* ... (Instead of Tom and Emily were riding through the forest.)
> .



I would just change the order: "_Tom and Emily rode through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing_."


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## wandle

wolfbm1 said:


> I wonder why the past simple was used for the verbs in red. The meaning of those verbs is that both uncle Henry and Dorothy were in the middle of the action expressed by them.


The reason is that the verbs in red are verbs of state, not action. 
With a verb of state, the simple form of the tense has the meaning of the continuous form. 
Therefore the continuous form of the tense is not normally needed.


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## wolfbm1

Elisa Pessoa said:


> I would just change the order: "_Tom and Emily rode through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing_."


And in the book I mentioned it is:
 "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing."

I wonder if this combination would be possible:

 "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun shone and the birds sang."

I guess it is enough to provide at least one sentence in the past continuous to set a scene.


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## Elisa Pessoa

wandle said:


> The reason is that the verbs in red are verbs of state, not action.
> With a verb of state, the simple form of the tense has the meaning of the continuous form.
> Therefore the continuous form of the tense is not normally needed.



That's correct! Yet, "_Look_" can still be both, a state or an action verb.
E.g. _I was looking at the sky when a bird flew over me.

_Please, correct me if I'm mistaken. Thanks!


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## Elisa Pessoa

wolfbm1 said:


> And in the book I mentioned it is:
> "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing."
> 
> I wonder if this combination would be possible:
> 
> "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun shone and the birds sang."
> 
> I guess it is enough to provide at least one sentence in the past continuous to set a scene.




That's my perspective. BUT I'm not a native!


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## Elisa Pessoa

E.g.2 "_I was sitting on my computer chair when I saw this thread_."


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## wolfbm1

What about this:
"Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. They looked at the beautiful scenery in front of them."


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## wolfbm1

Elisa Pessoa said:


> E.g.2 "_I was sitting on my computer chair when I saw this thread_."


That sentence is easy. Longer action and a short action.


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## Never Ever

wolfbm1 said:


> Hello.
> 
> "Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly.
> Today, however, they were not playing. Uncle Henry sat upon the doorstep and looked anxiously at the sky, which was even grayer than usual. Dorothy stood in the door with Toto in her arms, and looked at the sky too. Aunt Em was washing the dishes." Source: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum.
> 
> I wonder why the past simple was used for the verbs in red. The meaning of those verbs is that both uncle Henry and Dorothy were in the middle of the action expressed by them.


The verbs in red are in the past tense because they describe completed actions. They happened while something else was taking place, i.e. Aunt Em washing the dishes.

Say for example Aunt Em started washing the dishes at 10 AM. It's safe to assume she spent, say, 20 minutes washing dishes. That's a long action = past continuous.

During those 20 minutes several other short actions took place. Uncle Henry sat on the doorstep, looked at the sky etc. These actions took moments to complete (uncle Henry didn't spend 20 minutes looking at the sky) = past simple.


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## Elisa Pessoa

wolfbm1 said:


> That sentence is easy. Longer action and a short action.



Just to check you understand the usage of verbs like "to sit", "to look", etc.... they are action or non-action verbs.


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## JustKate

The reason Baum switched to simple past is, I think, because he was referring to a specific and fairly short period - the period in which Uncle Henry sat on the doorstep and looked at the sky, worrying about the weather. He wasn't doing whatever he was accustomed doing while sitting on the doorstep. He was for that specific period of time doing a specific thing. I think that's why the simple past is used. The past continuous is also possible, but I think the simple past is better.

In other words, I think I am pretty much agreeing with Elisa Pessoa.


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## Elisa Pessoa

wolfbm1 said:


> What about this:
> "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. They *looked* at the beautiful scenery in front of them."  *This one is right, too!
> 
> *


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## Never Ever

wolfbm1 said:


> What about this:
> "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. They looked at the beautiful scenery in front of them."


Were riding - sun shining - were singing = these verbs are used in the past continuous because they are setting the scene.
Looked implies a temporary action. I'd expect to read that they stopped and looked at the scenery and then something else happened (i.e. the rest of the story).


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## Elisa Pessoa

JustKate said:


> The reason Baum switched to simple past is, I think, because he was referring to a specific and fairly short period - the period in which Uncle Henry sat on the doorstep and looked at the sky, worrying about the weather. He wasn't doing whatever he was accustomed doing while sitting on the doorstep. He was for that specific period of time doing a specific thing. I think that's why the simple past is used. The past continuous is also possible, but I think the simple past is better.
> 
> In other words, I think I am pretty much agreeing with Elisa Pessoa.




Believe me, I'm (re)learning with this, too. 
This brainstorming is pretty cool!


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## wolfbm1

JustKate said:


> The reason Baum switched to simple past is, I think, because he was referring to a specific and fairly short period - the period in which Uncle Henry sat on the doorstep and looked at the sky, worrying about the weather. He wasn't doing whatever he was accustomed doing while sitting on the doorstep. He was for that specific period of time doing a specific thing. I think that's why the simple past is used. The past continuous is also possible, but I think the simple past is better.
> 
> In other words, I think I am pretty much agreeing with Elisa Pessoa.



 I wonder if we could replace "looked anxiously at the sky" with "had an anxious look at the sky"? Both actions are relatively short, aren't they?


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## Never Ever

Replacing looked at with had an anxious look at doesn't change the tense. Both times you're using the past simple.


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## wolfbm1

Never Ever said:


> Were riding - sun shining - were singing = these verbs are used in the past continuous because they are setting the scene.
> Looked implies a temporary action. I'd expect to read that they stopped and looked at the scenery and then something else happened (i.e. the rest of the story).


OK. Then I would have to continue with the past continuous:
"Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. They were looking at the beautiful scenery in front of them with great admiration. Suddenly, they noticed two roe deer grazing in the meadow. Tom stopped to take a picture. "


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## JustKate

wolfbm1 said:


> I wonder if we could replace "looked anxiously at the sky" with "had an anxious look at the sky"? Both actions are relatively short, aren't they?



Sure we could. I'd say "had an anxious look" indicates a shorter period of time than "looked anxiously" does, but they are both relatively short. And Never Ever is, of course, quite right that both are past simple.


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## Never Ever

wolfbm1 said:


> OK. Then I would have to continue with the past continuous:
> "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. They were looking at the beautiful scenery in front of them with great admiration. Suddenly, they noticed two roe deer grazing in the meadow. Tom stopped to take a picture. "


Yes


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## wolfbm1

Never Ever said:


> Replacing looked at with had an anxious look at doesn't change the tense. Both times you're using the past simple.


I thought that duration of "looked at" is a bit longer, maybe at least thirty seconds, than "had a look at", a brief, quick look or glance.


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## wolfbm1

Never Ever said:


> Yes


I think I'm ready to write a longer story, then.


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## Never Ever

wolfbm1 said:


> I thought that duration of "looked at" is a bit longer, maybe at least thirty seconds, than "had a look at", a brief, quick look or glance.


Well, no, they are essentially of the same duration. Think of it this way: you can have a quick look at something or you can have a good look at something. The first is brief, the second is longer. It's all a question of reference. A teacher could have a quick look at a student's essay and that could take 10, maybe 15 minutes, if the essay is quite long.

Either way, both verbs (looked/had a look) are in the past tense because the actions started and finished in the past while another longer action was happening. It doesn't matter if they took 5 seconds or 5 minutes, they were still shorter than the longer action.


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## JustKate

wolfbm1 said:


> I thought that duration of "looked at" is a bit longer, maybe at least thirty seconds, than "had a look at", a brief, quick look or glance.



It's impossible to quantify these things, but I agree. You can "look at something" for a short time or a long time, but a look is fairly brief - longer than a glance, but probably not as long as if you "looked at" it. But this is really subjective.


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## wolfbm1

Agatha Christie in "And Then There Were None" used the past simple at the beginning to set a scene and only later she used the past continuous:
"In the corner of a first-class smoking carriage, Mr. Justice Wargrave, lately retired from the bench, puffed at a cigar and ran an interested eye through the political news in the Times.
He laid the paper down and glanced out of the window. They were running now through Somerset. He glanced at his watch - another two hours to go."


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## Never Ever

She wasn't setting the scene, she was describing short actions that happened one after the other in the past (he puffed at his cigar, he looked at the newspaper, he put the paper down, he looked out of the window, he glanced at his watch) = past simple.

A longer action that had been happening in the background, an action that had started before he puffed at his cigar and continued after he glanced at his watch, is described using the past continuous. They started to run through Somerster at 11 AM, they were still running through Somerset at 2 PM. He puffed at his cigar between 11:15-11:25, looked at the paper between 11:20-11:30, put the paper down at 11:31, looked out of the window at 11:32 etc.


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## JustKate

I agree. She could have written "was puffing at a cigar and running an interested eye through the political news," but she didn't. She instead decided to simply list what Wargrave was doing. Past continuous might have been a bit unwieldy here.


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## wandle

Never Ever said:


> She wasn't setting the scene, she was describing short actions that happened one after the other in the past (he puffed at his cigar, he looked at the newspaper, he put the paper down, he looked out of the window, he glanced at his watch) = past simple.


The past simple is used because she is describing a succession of short actions.
She gives this sequence of short actions in order to set the scene.


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## Never Ever

The rule the OP is referring to says that we use the past continuous to "set the scene" in stories, i.e. describe the background situation at the moment when the action begins. In this case the author is not describing the background situation, she's just describing a succession of short actions. So she's not "setting the scene" per se, at least she's not "setting the scene" as the grammar books interpret scene setting.

Or in other words she's not opting to describe the background situatuon to set the scene, she's setting the scene by listing a series of short actions. Hence she's not using the past continuous, she's using the past simple.


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## wandle

We are told this is the beginning. If it is the beginning of the book, or the beginning of the chapter, it is certainly setting the scene. It is a recognised technique to take the reader right into the story by giving an action or series of actions in the past simple.

Another way of setting the scene is by using a verb of action in the past continuous (or a verb of state in the past simple - which has the same effect), as in Orwell's 1984:
_It was a bright cold day in April and the clocks were striking thirteen._


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## Never Ever

I understand what you're saying. What I'm saying is that grammar books such as the one mentioned earlier by the OP (_Grammarway_ by Jenny Dooley and Virginia Evans) list one of the uses of the past continuous as "setting the scene". What they mean is setting the scene by giving background information.

They don't explain that it is possible to set the scene in many different ways, one of which is by giving background information, another by listing short actions (using the simple past).

So learners get confused when they see the simple past used at the beginning of a chapter or book. They shouldn't be, because what they should have in mind is that we only use the past continuous (state verbs notwithstanding) when we give background information. This is not made clear in the grammar book: the rule goes "when you set the scene, you use the past continuous" whereas what it should say is "when you set the scene by giving background information, you use the past continuous".


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## wolfbm1

Elisa Pessoa said:


> That's my perspective. BUT I'm not a native!


Actually in certain context it is possible to say "The sun shone and the birds sang." I found it in Hans Christian Andersen's : The Bell, translated by Jean Hersholt.

"So these three dropped out while the others started off into the woods. The sun shone, the birds sang, and the children sang too, walking along hand in hand. They had not yet received any responsibilities or high position in life - all were equal in the eye of God on that Confirmation Day."

Maybe, instead of saying "Tom and Emily were riding through the forest. The sun was shining and the birds were singing." 
I could say 
"The sun shone and the birds sang while Tom and Emily were riding through the forest."


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## wolfbm1

wandle said:


> The reason is that the verbs in red are verbs of state, not action.
> With a verb of state, the simple form of the tense has the meaning of the continuous form.
> Therefore the continuous form of the tense is not normally needed.


I think I found the exception:
"Cinque was standing at the front. He was watching the morning sun, low in the sky, showing them their way. 
He heard his wife again, calling to him. Her voice seemed to come from the land that lay before him, Africa."
Source: Penguin Readers: Amistad, retold by D'Arcy and Evadne Adrian-Vallance.


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## JustKate

You can always find exceptions, Wolfbm1. Wandle says that in verbs of state the simple form has the same meaning as the continuous form, and therefore the continuous form is  "not normally needed," and that is correct. But that doesn't make the continuous form incorrect - it's just less common. In this particular sample sentence, I would agree that "stood" would work just as well as "was standing," but "was standing" is still fine. I wonder if the writers used it simply because they liked the parallel structure of _was standing_ combined with _was watching_.


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## YXWV

Uncle Henry sat upon the doorstep. Aunt Em was washing the dishes. The difference here is that main events are in the Simple, whereas the background is discribed in Continuous.


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## wolfbm1

JustKate said:


> You can always find exceptions, Wolfbm1. Wandle says that in verbs of state the simple form has the same meaning as the continuous form, and therefore the continuous form is  "not normally needed," and that is correct. But that doesn't make the continuous form incorrect - it's just less common. In this particular sample sentence, I would agree that "stood" would work just as well as "was standing," but "was standing" is still fine. I wonder if the writers used it simply because they liked the parallel structure of _was standing_ combined with _was watching_.


I think the writer used the continuous form of "stand" in order to complicate things for a pre-inermediate level student. Probably, because "stand" is a state verb, it would be enough to to use it in the present simple tense.


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## wolfbm1

YXWV said:


> Uncle Henry sat upon the doorstep. Aunt Em was washing the dishes. The difference here is that main events are in the Simple, whereas the background is discribed in Continuous.


What about the sentence that opens the paragraph:
"Today, however, they were not playing. Uncle Henry ..."

Why the author didn't put it at the end of the preceding paragraph, which reads:
"Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly."


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## JustKate

wolfbm1 said:


> What about the sentence that opens the paragraph:
> "Today, however, they were not playing. Uncle Henry ..."
> 
> Why the author didn't put it at the end of the preceding paragraph, which reads:
> "Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly."



Because Toto and Dorothy weren't playing at the time this paragraph opened. This is what they ordinarily did on ordinary days, but this is obviously not an ordinary day.


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## ecomets

Past continuous is usually used when referring to an action in the past that is still happening and has not finished.  Simple past, of course, are actions in the past that have stopped - shorter period or action of the verb in the direct past.


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## wolfbm1

JustKate said:


> Because Toto and Dorothy weren't playing at the time this paragraph opened. This is what they ordinarily did on ordinary days, but this is obviously not an ordinary day.


That's a good point. Thank you, JustKate.


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## wolfbm1

ecomets said:


> Past continuous is usually used when referring to an action in the past that is still happening and has not finished.  Simple past, of course, are actions in the past that have stopped - shorter period or action of the verb in the direct past.


OK. So, 
a) past continues - an action in the past that has not finished
b) simple past - an action in the past that is over. (I am afraid to say: that has stopped, because we are talking about simple past.)


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## JustKate

I think that's a very useful guideline, Wolfbm1. I wouldn't go so far as to call it a rule (because you will find exceptions, particularly in the use of the simple past), but I think that's a very good way to look at this issue.


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## wandle

ecomets said:


> Past continuous is usually used when referring to an action in the past that is still happening and has not finished.  Simple past, of course, are actions in the past that have stopped - shorter period or action of the verb in the direct past.





wolfbm1 said:


> OK. So,
> a) past continues - an action in the past that has not finished
> b) simple past - an action in the past that is over.


Sorry, but I must disagree with this. All actions presented in a past tense are over and finished. 

This is true even if you say (a) _'I was reading War and Peace before dinner, but I have not finished it'_. In this case, you have not finished the book, but you have finished that action of reading which you were doing before you began to eat dinner.

The difference between the past simple and the past continuous is in the way you look at the action. 
It is not an objective difference in the facts, but a subjective difference in the mind.

The past simple looks at the action from the outside, so to speak, and sees it as a single thing, a unit: often against the background of something else.

(b) _While I was reading Tolstoy, the door bell rang._

The past continuous looks inside the action, so to speak, and sees it as a process: often making it the background for something else.

(c) _While the bell was still ringing, Fred called out, 'I'll get it!'_

All these events in our little scenario took place before dinner and therefore at the time of writing or speaking they were all finished long since.

In sentence (b) and (c) there is no difference in the facts as regards the ringing of the bell. 
In both cases, we are talking about the same event: a ringing which started, went on for a little time and then stopped.

The difference between (b) 'rang' and (c) 'was ringing' lies purely in the way the writer is looking at that event.


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## wolfbm1

wandle said:


> Sorry, but I must disagree with this. All actions presented in a past tense are over and finished.
> 
> The difference between (b) 'rang' and (c) 'was ringing' lies purely in the way the writer is looking at that event.


That's an interesting statement. It must be true but it is also a bit revolutionary for me.

In Total English Pre-intermediate, by Richard Acklam and Araminta Crace, is written:

„Use the Past Continuous to talk about an action in progress at a particular time in the past.
I was holding the dog. …

Use the Past Simple to talk about complete actions in the past.
Did you kill the dog?”

I wonder how the action in the sentence “I was holding the dog.” can be finished and at the same time in progress or in the course of being carried out. 
Here is the context for the above sentence:

“And what, precisely, were you doing in the garden?' he asked.
'I was holding the dog,' I replied.
'And why were you holding the dog?' he asked.
… It was something I wanted to do.”
Source: An excerpt, in the New York Times, from the book 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time' by Mark Haddon.


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## PaulQ

wolfbm1 said:


> I wonder how the action in the sentence “I was holding the dog.” can be finished and at the same time in progress or in the course of being carried out.
> Here is the context for the above sentence:
> 
> “And ' he asked.
> 'I was holding the dog,' I replied.
> 'And why were you holding the dog?' he asked.
> … It was something I wanted to do.”


It is finished because, in the present, i.e. as the boy is being asked the question, he is no longer holding the dog. When he spoke (in the present), he was describing a past continuous action.

It may help if, with verbs in the continuous, you added "I was [in the process of] holding the dog."

The boy has been asked, "what were you doing?" - he therefore replied in the same aspect of the verb. It could have been:

And ' he asked. "what *did *you *do*?
'I *held *the dog,' I replied. - To me, this restricts the meaning to a single action that is compressed to one point; one discrete action.
'And why did you *hold *the dog?' he asked.
… It was something I *had been wanting* to do.” - "I had been [in the process of] wanting to do."


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## wolfbm1

PaulQ said:


> It is finished because, in the present, i.e. as the boy is being asked the question, he is no longer holding the dog. When he spoke (in the present), he was describing a past continuous action.
> It may help if, with verbs in the continuous, you added "I was [in the process of] holding the dog."


>> "It is finished because, in the present, i.e. as the boy is being asked the question, he is no longer holding the dog." 
That makes sense.

>> "he was describing a past continuous action." 
It doesn't take long to say "I was holding the dog", does it. Or maybe it doesn't matter. A process could last just a few seconds.


> It could have been:
> And he asked "what *did *you *do*?
> 'I *held *the dog,' I replied. - To me, this restricts the meaning to a single action that is compressed to one point; one discrete action.


(I have almost confused "descrete" = discontinuous with discreet = cautious.)
So we are not concerned about the continuity of the action.


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## wolfbm1

I think that we can use a squeezebox for comparison. 
The compressed bellows is the equivalent of the simple past.
The expanded bellows is the equivalent of the present continuous.


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## wandle

The difference between (a) 'I was holding the dog' and (b) 'I am holding the dog' is that sentence (a) tells us that the action is finished and (b) tells us that it is not.


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## wolfbm1

Similarly, in "I held the dog", the action is finished, and in "I hold the dog" the action is not finished. Both actions are compressed and discrete.


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## JustKate

No, "I hold the dog," is in the present tense, so it means you're holding the dog as you're speaking. It might be discrete, but you need to indicate that, "I hold the dog when I give him his shots."


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## se16teddy

wolfbm1 said:


> Hello.
> 
> "Toto played all day long, and Dorothy played with him, and loved him dearly.
> Today, however, they were not playing. Uncle Henry sat upon the doorstep and looked anxiously at the sky, which was even grayer than usual. Dorothy stood in the door with Toto in her arms, and looked at the sky too. Aunt Em was washing the dishes." Source: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum.
> 
> I wonder why the past simple was used for the verbs in red. The meaning of those verbs is that both uncle Henry and Dorothy were in the middle of the action expressed by them.


I think it is just that the author does not wish to emphasize that another event (such as the tornado) occurred while the sitting, looking and standing were continuing. The function of the past continuous tense is to point to another event that occurred while the continuing action continued.


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